







Class 

Book., . 7 1 

Cojpght N?JL( 

confRicHT i^^sm 







Uncle ZeB and His Friends 




I • 


1 . 



% 



4 


• » 




% 








iSL* 



4 




But best of all were the stories the old man told. 



UMCLE-ZEB-& 
HIS - FRIENDS 

BY-EDWARD W FRENTZ 



WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY 

EDNAA.TREMAINE 

SCHOOL EDITION 


BOSTON 

THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY PRESS' 


COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY PRESS, INC. 


COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY PRESS, INC. 


MAY 25 1920 

mi 

To the Perry Mason Company, publishers of the Youth's 
Companion^ in which all of these stories first appeared, 
the author owes and hereby expresses his gratitude for 
the generous permission to reprint them here. 


©C!.A.'570121 


To the spirit of childhood, the most 
beautiful thing in the world, these 
little stories are reverently dedicated 



Uncle Zee’s cabin stood at the end of a short lane 
that ran up from the ‘'back road” toward the moun- 
tain. Two great poplars shaded its mossy roof, and 
their silver leaves shook and shimmered in the sunlight, 
no matter how still the day was. Boys and girls had 
often sat on the old bench by the door, and looked up 
into the great trees in the hope of finding the leaves 
motionless; but there had never been a time when they 
were not moving, as if unseen fingers were tickling 
them and they were trying to get away. 

Behind the cabin was a little garden-patch, where 
the old man raised most of the things he needed to eat 
during the winter; and in one corner of the lot stood 
the shop, a treasure-house of things that the old man 
made. There were beautiful canes, and strange wind- 
mills, and graceful canoes, and dainty boxes of birch- 
bark, and other things from woods and fields that delight 
the heart of a boy who loves the out-of-doors and who 
likes to make things. 

But best of all were the stories that the old man told 
as he worked. Some were stories about girls, and some 
were about boys, and there were many that had to do 
with animals. No one of the children had ever heard 
all of them, but an old friend of Uncle Zeb’s knew them 
all, and after a time set them down in a book; and this is 
the book. 


¥ 






M 




’ 9 .- i 





9 m 

it 


A 


I . 


• « 

» I L.ir 


9 


# 


• I - • 




‘ r' ,/■ 


r ‘ M f 


■ A 




•# 


‘-•kf 


- 1 . 


V. 




It * 






di. «•* 


A A 


^ r 


« i 


f.f 




» f 


. -ti 


' -.r 


■ » 


-’,' T' 




I 


CONTENTS 


The Outstretched Hand i 

The Tinker’s Willow 5 

Bob 9 

The Pirate of the Pond Hole 14 

The Runaway Duck 18 

The Indian Basket 22 

A Son of the Mountains 26 

The Family Garden 30 

An Interrupted Vacation 35 

Phcebe Ann’s Christmas Tree 40 

The Little Water People 46 

Curing Rosa May 49 

On Salt-Water Ice 54 

The Little Path 57 

How Christmas Came at Midsummer 61 

Grandfather’s Nickname 67 

Lemonade Sandy 71 

Caught in a Flood 75 

Jimmie’s Birds 79 

An Indian Birthday Spoon 83 

Uncle David’s Brother 87 

A Prisoner Set Free 92 

Pine-Needle Pictures 96 

The Abandoned Well 100 

In Lost Swamp 104 


X 


CONTENTS 


The Captives 109 

On the Old Wharf . 112 

Uncle Dan’s Bear Story 116 

A Pioneer’s Thanksgiving . . 119 

Pedro’s Wooden Leg 123 

'‘Old Mustard” 128 

A Good Lesson • i 33 

How Grant Earned His Calf 136 

Johnnie’s Bright Idea 140 

The Little Red Workers 145 

The Dog that Danced .148 

The Star in the Grass 153 

The Deer with a Red Tie 158 

The Battle 162 

The Storehouse in the Wood 165 

Gathering the Treasure 169 

The Game of “T. G. B. B.” 174 

Why the Squirrels Moved 177 

Grandfather’s Dan 182 

His Task . . . . 186 

Roy’s Bear-Hunt 190 

Out of the Big Marsh 195 

Grandmother’s Panther 200 

Three Orphans 205 

A Game Postponed 209 

The Scratching on the Door 214 

The Tree that Fought for France 220 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


But best of all were the stories the old man told . Frontispiece 
The dog did not have to he told what to do. ... In half a 

minute he had the hoy in shallow water .... 12 

Out of one of the lower doors of the house a big gray rat was 

creeping 19 

But Peter would come and rub lovingly against him and purr 

like a little spinning-wheel . . , 38 

It blew so hard that the water swept clear across the point, 
and it looked as if Santa Claus could not get out to the 

lighthouse 41 

In a few minutes the new face had two big blue eyes and a 
rosebud mouth and curly, golden hair and a pair of pink 

cheeks 52 

When the big doctor came that day the little boy was sleeping. 

By his side lay the skates and the little ship . . . 65 

It was hot, hot weather, and as people went by, the cold lem- 

onade looked tempting. They, too, heard the story of 

Sandy 73 

An old Indian in a red shirt, and with moccasins on his feet, 
held the canoe steady while the boys dropped carefully into 
it; and then, like an arrow, the little craft dashed away . 77 

Jimmie kept bravely on until he could just reach out and 

untwist the string that held the bird's leg .... 81 

In his hand was the canteen which he was trying to fill again 

for his wounded enemy 90 

Ethel began with a house; Henry was busy with a sailboat; 
and Uncle Hubert made a camel and its driver resting 
under a tree 97 



UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


The Outstretched Hand 

T here was no answer when Johnnie knocked at 
Uncle Zeb’s cabin door; and so, after waiting 
a few minutes, he went round the corner and 
along the path to the shop. There he heard someone 
pounding, and through the open door caught sight of 
the old man working at his bench. 

‘‘Ah!” said Uncle Zeb. “So you have come again to 
see the old man work!” 

He brushed the shavings from the top of a stool, and 
Johnnie sat down. 

To make sure that he should not touch the old man’s 
tools or handle the other things on the bench without 
permission, Johnnie put his hands in his pockets. As he 
did so, he felt something hard, and drew it out. It was a 
roll of large lozenges that he had forgotten; but now he 
took it out and was going to put one of the lozenges into 
his mouth, when he happened to think that it would be 
most impolite to eat his candy without offering some to 
Uncle Zeb. 

The old man smiled at him through his big glasses, 
and took some. When he had tasted it a little while, he 
said, “Do you know where it grows?” 


2 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


‘‘Where what grows?” asked Johnnie. 

“This candy,” said the old man. 

“Why, candy doesn’t grow; you have to buy it at the 
store — unless somebody gives it to you,” said Johnnie. 

“Yes, but I know where this kind grows. It comes 
from a bush or little tree — a most curious tree. How 
would you like to go with me to look for it along the foot 
of the mountain?” 

“That would be great!” cried Johnnie. And in a few 
minutes the shop was locked, and the old man and the 
boy were climbing the rocky path behind the garden 
patch. 

“What does it look like — this bush that the candy 
grows on?” asked Johnnie, after they had gone a little 
way. 

“Well,” said Uncle Zeb, “it is different from any 
other bush or tree in the woods. When it is young, the 
bark is smooth and very green — as green as grass; but 
when it grows older, it begins to turn brown, and gets 
full of wrinkles, just as people do.” And he laughed 
until his own brown, wrinkled face looked like a good- 
natured baked apple. 

“But that is not the strangest thing about it,” he 
went on. “The strangest thing is that the leaves are 
like little hands stretched out to beckon to you. On 
most trees and bushes the leaves are all of one kind; but 
on this bush you will find three kinds, and every one will 
be a little bright green mitten. Some of the mittens will 
have one thumb, as all mittens should have, and some 


THE OUTSTRETCHED HAND 


3 

will have no thumb, and some will have two thumbs, 
one on each side. Now look sharp. 

For a little while longer they went on; then Johnnie 
caught sight of a green stem running up into a roof of 
large, glossy green leaves. He looked closer, and there 
among the leaves was one shaped exactly like a mitten, 
with the thumb in just the right place, and another with 
the thumb on the left-hand side; and then he saw that 
they were all mittens, as the old man had said, some 
with two thumbs, some with one thumb, and some with 
no thumb at all. 

‘H’ve found it. Uncle Zeb!” he cried. 

The old man came back, smiling. “Why, sure enough! 
You’ve hit it right the first time, just as slick as a real 
woodsman could do.” 

But Johnnie was not smiling. Instead, he was looking 
the bush all over, lifting the bunches of leaves and feel- 
ing the under sides of them. “I thought you said the 
candy grew on it,” he said, in a disappointed tone. 

The old man laughed again. “Nature does n’t put 
her candy in the show-case,” he chuckled. “ She puts it 
where it will keep better, and where it will always be 
fresh. She makes you hunt for it. Now you take hold 
with me and pull hard, and we’ll see what we find.” 

Shoulder to shoulder with the old man, Johnnie took 
hold of the bush, and both of them pulled. Little by 
little it started. The earth began to rise in a long ridge. 
Plop! plop! plop! The little downward-running roots 
gave way, and then suddenly a long, snake-like root 


4 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


that lay just below the top of the ground broke out, and 
both Johnnie and Uncle Zeb went over on their backs. 

‘‘Now,” said the old man, “we will go down to the 
brook.” 

He took the long root with him, and when they had 
carefully washed it in the clear running water, he passed 
it to Johnnie. 

“Taste it,” he said. 

Johnnie bit out a piece of the bark — white, tender, 
and juicy. “O-o-o, goody!” he cried. “It’s just what 
you said — it tastes just the same as the candy!” 

“Yes, only better,” added Uncle Zeb, “for it isn’t so 
sweet, and it has the flavor of the woods, where all sorts 
of good things are stored up for us if we know where to 
look for them. And besides, you earned it yourself.” 


The Tinker’s Willow 

O NE day, when my Grandfather Gifford was about 
seven years old, he looked across the road to his 
father’s blacksmith shop, and seeing someone 
sitting on the bench by the door, went over to find out 
who it was. 

He found a little old man, with thick, bushy eyebrows 
and bright blue eyes. His clothes were made all of 
leather, which creaked and rattled when he moved. By 
his side was a partly open pack, in which grandfather 
could see curious tools and sheets of shiny tin. By that 
he knew that the man was the traveling tinker, who 
came once or twice a year to mend leaky pans and pails, 
and of whom he had heard his mother speak. 

The old man was eating his luncheon — a slice or two 
of bread, a bit of cold meat, and a cold potato; and be- 
cause it seemed so poor a luncheon, grandfather went 
back to the house and brought two big apples from the 
cellar. The old man thanked him and ate the apples. 
Then he got up, brushed the bread-crumbs from his 
leather breeches, and taking a little tin dipper from his 
pack, went down to the brook for a drink of water. 
When he had had his fill, he came back to the bench and 
sat down. 

“Now, my boy,” he said, “we will make a tree grow 
here by the brook. There should be one, for shade.” 


6 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


‘‘Make a tree!” cried grandfather. “How can we 
make a tree.^ I thought only God made trees.” 

“True,” said the old man. “Only God makes trees, 
but sometimes we can help Him.” 

With that, he took from the bench at his side a stick 
that he had cut somewhere by the road, and had been 
using for a cane. It was slender and straight, and grand- 
father noticed that the bark was smooth and of a beau- 
tiful light green. 

“Of this,” said the old man, “we will make a tree in 
which the birds of the air shall build their nests, and 
under which the beasts of the field shall find shelter and 
rest in the heat of the day. But first there shall be music, 
to please the spirits of the springtime. Take this stick 
down to the brook, and wet it all over.” 

So my grandfather took the stick and did as the old 
man told him. When he came back to the bench, the 
tinker had a large horn-handled knife open in his hand. 
With the blade, which seemed very sharp, he made a 
single cut through the bark of the stick, about a foot 
from one end, and by holding the knife still, and spin- 
ning the stick slowly toward him in his fingers, he car- 
ried the cut all the way round. Then, near the end, he 
cut a deep notch, and four or five smaller notches in a 
line farther down; and after that he laid the stick across 
his knee, and turning it all the while, began to pound it 
gently with the handle of the knife. 

When he had pounded a long time, he laid down the 
knife, and taking the stick in both hands, gave it a little 


THE TINKER’S WILLOW 


7 


twist. At that, grandfather heard something pop, and 
saw the bark slip from the end of the stick above the 
knife-cut, all whole except for the notches: a smooth, 
green tube. 

Of the part of the stick from which he had slipped the 
bark, the old man cut away more than half, and across 
the upper end he made a smooth, slanting cut. Then he 
bade grandfather wet the stick again, and when he had 
done it, he slipped the bark back to its place, and put the 
end of the stick in his mouth and began to blow; and 
out of the holes he had cut, which he stopped, one after 
another, with his fingers, came what grandfather said 
was the sweetest music he had ever heard — music like 
the voice of a bird singing a long way off, or like that of 
a tiny bell. 

As the old man played, he seemed to forget all about 
grandfather; but by and by he laid down the whistle, 
and smiled and said, ‘‘Come. Now we will make the 
tree.” 

And together the old man and the boy walked down 
to the brook, and crossed over on some stepping-stones, 
to a place where the ground was soft and black and 
wet; and there, while the boy held the stick straight, the 
old man pushed it far down into the mud until it stood 
firm and true, with the whistle at the upper end of it. 
And the old man took off his hat, and bowing to the 
stick, seemed to my grandfather to make a speech to it. 

“Little brother,” he said, “we leave you here, where 
you will never be hungry or thirsty. You have made 


8 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


your little music for us to-day, but when you have grown 
tall and strong, One who is greater than I shall play 
upon you with the breath of his mighty winds; and when 
this little boy is older than I am now,” — here he put 
his hand on my grandfather’s head, — ‘‘his children’s 
children shall hear your music and be glad.” 

In a little while after that, the old man put on his 
pack and went away; but my grandfather could not for- 
get him, and almost every day he looked at the stick by 
the brook. The whistle at the top began to wither and 
dry up, and the loose bark cracked open and fell away, 
until it seemed as if the whole stick must be dead. But 
one day my grandfather saw that a tiny bud had ap- 
peared below where the whistle had been; and the bud 
became a little sprout, and the sprout a shoot, and other 
shoots followed, until the stick was indeed a little tree. 

Through all the years that came after, it grew taller 
and stronger, until “The Tinker’s Willow” was known 
as the greatest tree in all the countryside, and the birds 
did, indeed, build their nests among its branches, and 
the cattle lay in its shade in the hot noontide. 

Even when my grandfather was an old, old man, and 
had grown-up sons and daughters and many grand- 
children, he loved to sit on the bench by the shop and 
listen to the voice of the wind among the leaves of the 
great tree; and then, if we asked him, he would tell us 
again of the tinker who planted it, and of the music that 
came from the stick out of which it grew. 


Bob 

E arly one morning Mark Lewis was awakened 
by a low whining under his window. Mark was 
spending the summer on his grandfather’s farm, 
and his bedroom, being in the ell of the house, was just 
above the side door. 

Mark crawled quickly out of bed and ran to the open 
window. The big, flat door-stone was just beneath him, 
and on the stone sat a puppy. 

The dog was brown and white, with a coat of long, 
thick hair that would have been pretty if it had not been 
wet and muddy, full of snarls and tangled with burs. 

The little fellow was so thin that anyone could count 
all his ribs. He was shivering, too, for the early morning 
air was sharp. 

The dog, hearing the slight noise that Mark made 
when he went to the window, looked up at him with a 
pair of soft brown eyes that seemed to say, “Please give 
me something to eat. I am a poor dog that has no home 
and is out of work!” 

Mark hurried down, and opened the door. The little 
dog came in, whimpering, and wiggling all over. In a 
minute his little pink tongue was lapping a dish of milk, 
and it kept on until the last drop was gone. 

It took a good deal of teasing on the part of Mark and 
his cousins, Fred and Charlie, to get permission to keep 


lO 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


the puppy; but at last grandfather and grandmother 
said yes, and all three of the boys were very happy. 
They gave the dog the name of Bob, and began at once 
to teach him to mind and to do tricks. 

One day, when they had had him about a week, they 
were playing with him in front of the house. Mark had 
an apple that he would throw for Bob to chase; but 
they thought it was better fun sometimes not to throw 
the apple, but only to make the motion. Poor Bob would 
see Mark’s arm move, and away he would dash, with- 
out stopping to see whether the apple went or not; and 
then he would look so puzzled that you could not help 
laughing at him. 

While they were playing in that way, the doctor drove 
along and stopped to see what the boys were doing. 
When he had watched them a moment, he called them 
up to his carriage, and said, ‘‘Boys, I am sorry to see 
that you are lying to your dog.” 

“Why, sir, what do you mean.^” asked Fred. “We 
have n’t said anything to him, and he could n’t under- 
stand it if we did.” 

“Yes,” said the doctor, “but people sometimes tell 
lies by what they do as well as by what they say. Your 
little dog has only a small dog’s mind. He cannot think 
things out for himself, as you can. When you make a 
motion as if to throw the apple, he trusts you : he thinks 
you mean to throw it; and when you hold the apple 
back, you really tell him a lie. By and by he will learn 
that he cannot trust you, and then he will not do what 
you tell him to. You ought never to lie to a dog.” 


BOB 


II 


That seemed funny to the boys at first, but they all 
liked the doctor, and so they stopped fooling Bob. In 
time he became so well trained that he would do any- 
thing his young masters told him to do, if only he under- 
stood what they meant. 

Best of all, he liked to bring things out of the water; 
and he had learned that he could trust his young friends 
so surely that, if one of them only made a motion to- 
ward the water, in Bob would go, certain that he would 
find there something that must be brought to land. 

One afternoon near the end of the long vacation the 
boys went down to the shore of the pond to play. While 
Mark and Fred were watching a turtle, little Charlie 
went over to a big rock that reached out into deep wa- 
ter. All at once there was a splash and a scream, and 
Charlie was gone. He had slipped from the rock. 

The other boys ran, crying, toward him, and Mark 
lay down on his stomach, to reach out as far as he could; 
but Charlie was nowhere to be seen. In their fear both 
boys screamed at the top of their voices. A second later 
Bob came tearing out of the bushes, barking as if he 
knew something was wrong, and was trying to say, 
“What’s the matter.^ What do you want me to do.^ ” 

Both boys had the same thought at the same time. 
Bob could do what they could not. Each made the 
motion of throwing something into the water, and each 
cried, “In, Bob, in! Go fetch it!” 

With a great splash Bob leaped clear of the rock and 
began to swim in a circle. He had not made even one 



The dog did not have to he told what to do. ... In half a 
minute he had the hoy in shallow water. 


BOB 


13 


turn when Charlie’s head came up close at hand. The 
dog did not have to be told what to do. He knew that 
he was there to get something, so he fastened his teeth 
in Charlie’s coat-collar, and in half a minute had him 
in shallow water, where the boys could drag him out. 

That evening, when the doctor had come down from 
Charlie’s room, and had said that he would be all right 
in the morning, and the boys had told him again how 
quickly and how well Bob had acted, the doctor patted 
the dog’s curly head tenderly, and turning to Mark, 
said, ‘‘Now do you see, my boy, why I told you never to 
lie to a dog.” 


The Pirate of the Pond Hole 

T he brook on the Alden farm comes dancing 
and singing along through the woods; it strolls 
out into the pasture, wriggles under the road 
through a dark, rock-bound hole, and then, as if tired 
and in search of rest, it stretches itself out in the duck 
pond. Tall willows in soft green dresses fan it all day, 
and cat-o’-nine-tails whisper little secrets to it. 

To Lawrence Alden the brook and pond are friends 
and playmates, always ready to amuse him, or tell 
him something that he did not know before; and so he 
has spent much time with them. 

On the still water of the pond there swam a flock of 
twenty little mandarin ducks, all his own. Their mother 
was always with them, sailing from one little cove to 
another, like a ship in a fleet of boats, calling them back 
to her side when they got too far away, as the ship calls 
in its boats when the sea grows rough. Lawrence knew 
that the mother duck would look after her little flock 
faithfully, but there were some dangers from which she 
could not protect them. Once, when he was lying by the 
shore, an evil-looking crow had sailed over, close to the 
surface of the water. The old duck had called the young 
ones to her with a great quacking, and had thrashed 
the water so hard with her wings that the crow had 
passed; but he alighted on a fence-post near by, and sat 


THE PIRATE OF THE POND HOLE 15 

there, scolding and muttering to himself, till Lawrence 
drove him away. 

Another time, as Lawrence was watching some polly- 
wogs, a slim brown body slipped silently out from be- 
tween two rocks in the bank, dived into the pool, and 
came up with a small fish. Then, seeing Lawrence move 
a little, it glared at him with a beady black eye, and 
hissed like an angry cat. A mink! It would go hard with 
the little ducks if a mink ever got among them! 

For a week Lawrence counted the ducks every night, 
and found the number right. Then, one evening, there 
were only nineteen, nor could he find the missing one 
anywhere. The next night two more were gone, and 
the day after that, still another. The old duck seemed 
frightened. She kept her flock close beside her, and 
stayed with them near the shore. 

Most of the day now, Lawrence watched from his 
place under the willows, but neither the crow nor the 
mink came back. Then just before noon one day, there 
was a great fluttering, and with a terrified ‘‘Quack!” 
one of the little ducks went out of sight before his very 
eyes. He saw nothing touch it; it seemed to be dragged 
under the water and never came up again. Only a 
widening circle of ripples remained to show the spot. 

At the barn Lawrence found Henry, his father’s 
hired man, and told him what he had seen. 

“Aha!” said Henry. “I guess I know the old boy 
that is doing the mischief. We must get him, or you 
will not have a duck left. I’ll help you after dinner.” 


i6 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 

When the meal was over, Henry went up to his room, 
and came back with a large fish-hook. To the shank of 
it he fastened a stout piece of copper wire about a foot 
long, with a loop in the end; and through the loop he 
passed a strong cord. From the cellar he brought up an 
empty two-gallon jug, which he corked tight, and to the 
handle of which he tied the other end of the cord that 
held the hook. 

“Now,’’ he said to Lawrence, “get me a piece of meat 
with some fat and some tough gristle on it.” 

When Lawrence brought it, Henry pushed it on the 
hook; and taking the things with them, the two started 
for the shore. 

Lawrence pointed out the place where the little duck 
had gone down. “It’s about ten feet deep there,” said 
Henry, and he shortened the cord on the jug till the 
hook was only seven or eight feet from the handle. 
Then, once more making sure that the cork was tight, 
he pushed the jug slowly out from the shore into the 
deeper water of the pond, and threw the baited hook 
beyond it. 

“Now,” he said, “I must go back to my work. Sit 
still, watch the jug, and see what happens.” 

For an hour nothing happened, except that the jug, 
turning first this way and then that, and bowing 
gravely to all the shores as the gentle wind moved it, 
drifted slowly away. Then suddenly it gave a jump and 
went over on its side, and at length passed out of sight 
under water. But in a moment it appeared once more. 


THE PIRATE OF THE POND HOLE 17 

dancing and whirling in the liveliest way; then it began 
to move rapidly out from the shore. 

Lawrence started on the run for Henry. When the 
two got back to the shore, the jug was gone; but they 
took the boat and pushed out, and soon found the jug 
among the cat-o’-nine-tails. Henry reached down into 
the water and began to pull. The cord jerked this way 
and that, but steadily came in, till there rose by the 
boat a great black head like a snake’s, but with a beak 
like a hawk’s, and angry yellow eyes. Then a broad 
back appeared, and two wildly pawing flippers. It 
was a great mud-turtle, the enemy of all water-birds. 
Across his shell from back to front he measured more 
than eighteen inches, and later they found that he 
weighed nearly twenty pounds. From his dark hole in 
the mud he had risen silently to the surface, and catch- 
ing the little ducks by the legs, had dragged them down. 

‘‘But why,” asked Lawrence, “did you put the jug 
on the line.^” 

“Because,” said Henry, “if I had tied the cord to a 
stake or the tree, he might have broken loose. The jug 
he could n’t hold down long, for it was full of air, and 
so it kept pulling him up till he was tired out.” 


The Runaway Duck 

I N the centre of the big city park is a beautiful little 
pond, and in the pond is an island, and on the 
island stands a curious little house. 

■ There are no windows, but only two long rows of 
doors: one on the ground, the other reached, not by 
flights of stairs, but by boards sloping gently up to the 
second story and down almost to the water’s edge. 

Above the little house bend the long, graceful branches 
of willow trees, of a lovely light green; and in front of it, 
on the beach of sand and gravel, the waves are always 
laughing. 

Those who live in this house wear nothing but snow- 
white clothing, with yellow stockings and shoes, for 
they are a great family of ducks that belong to the city. 

One fine morning a baby duck came to the door of 
one of the upper rooms in the little house. He stood 
there a while, looking up and down the shore. It seemed 
too good a day to stay in, so the little duck waddled 
slowly down the sloping board-walk, dipped his bill into 
the water to see if it was warm, and then started to 
swim away. 

He had gone nearly to the end of the island, and was 
having a happy time, when out from behind a big bush 
swam an old drake, or grandfather duck, big and strong, 
and very cross. 



Out of one of the lower doors of the house a big gray rat was creeping. 



20 UNCLE ZEE AND HIS FRIENDS , . 

I 

The little duck was, of course, mtich frighteneH.|'|^ 
tried to turn round and swim back; but he just pouridied 
the water with his feet and beat it with his small wingi, 
without going ahead any. [ 

The big drake swam right up to him and gave him a 
hard thump with his bill, which drove his head clear 
under water, so that he got his mouth full, and almost 
choked. The big drake followed him and kept rapping 
him with his bill. Not until he was almost back to the 
little house did the old drake leave him. Then he went 
away, quacking crossly. 

The little cluck crawled out of the water and lay on 
his side on the warm sand, trying to get his breath, tqo 
tired to move or even to stand. ^ ^ 

Just then he saw something that filled him with 
terror. Out of one of the lower doors in the house a big 
gray rat was creeping. His tiny black eyes were shining 
like beads, and he was looking right at the little duck. ! 

Nearer and nearer the rat crept. The duck tried to 
get up on his feet. 

He was so frightened that he cried, ‘‘Peep! peep 17 
as loud as he could. 

It was a small, weak voice, and the only one to hear it 
was the old drake. He knew that it was a cry for help^ 
and he began to paddle and flutter as fast as he could 
toward the shore, all the time crying, “Quack! quack!” 
in such a way that all the other ducks heard it and knew 
something was wrong. 

The rat had stopped now, as if he did not quite know 


THE RUNAWAY DUCK 


21 


what to do; and just as the drake reached the shore, he 
turned and started to crawl back under the house. But 
he was too late. One rap of the old drake’s bill sent him 
over on his back. Before he could get up the drake had 
hit him another rap, and squealing loudly, the rat ran 
in under the duck-house, glad to get away. The rat fam- 
ily had no dinner that night, and the old father rat had 
to stay in bed for three days. 

As for the little duck, he was happy enough to have 
his mother take him by the wing and drag him up the 
board and into the nest. 


The Indian Basket 

O N the top shelf of the what-not in grandmother’s 
old-fashioned room had stood for many years 
the Indian basket. Grace and Ethel always 
thought of it in big capital letters, because of the way in 
which it had come into the family, and the care that 
grandmother took of it. 

In the old days, when grandfather was a young man, 
he had crossed the plains to the great West; and one day, 
when he was riding alone by the banks of a little stream, 
he had come upon the bones of a child — a little Indian 
girl, he thought, because of some pieces of what had 
once been her dress. The bones were white and clean, 
and on some of them were marks that looked as if they 
had been made by teeth — probably the teeth of wolves. 
Near by lay the Indian basket. 

It was beautifully made, of closely woven twigs and 
grasses, some of which had been colored with bright 
dyes that made a curious pattern on the finished basket. 
In shape it was nearly round, and in size about as large 
as a small cabbage. When grandfather found the basket, 
there was nothing in it but a few pebbles from the bed 
of the stream, and two or three pretty shells of fresh- 
water mussels — just the kind of things that a little girl 
would like to play with. 

Grandfather took the basket, and brought it home 


THE INDIAN BASKET 


23 


with him and gave it to grandmother; and many a time 
Grace and Ethel had heard the story of the little Indian 
girl, and wondered how she had happened to be alone 
by the stream, and whether it was really wolves that 
had got her. 

Of course, grandmother took great care of the basket. 
She seldom used it; and as for the little girls, they were 
not allowed to take it at all except when grandmother 
herself put it into their hands, full of fruit, or flowers, 
or other dainties for some sick neighbor; and then they 
were told to carry it carefully and to be sure to bring it 
back. 

But one day they were left alone; and after playing 
for a time at one thing or another, they stole into grand- 
mother’s room. In its usual place on the shelf stood the 
basket. 

“Let’s take it out in the garden and pick it full of 
raspberries,” cried Grace. 

“All right,” said Ethel. And in a moment they were 
on their way. 

It took them half an hour to All the basket. The ripe, 
juicy berries they poured carefully into a dish, and were 
just about to put the basket back in its place, when 
Ethel noticed that the berries had made some red stains 
on the inside of it; so they took it to the kitchen sink 
and with a wet cloth wiped the stains out; but the cloth 
left a few drops of water in the basket, and Ethel turned 
it upside down to let them run out. 

“Oh, look!” cried Alice. “When it’s that way, it is 


24 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


just like the helmets that soldiers used to wear! The 
handle is the strap to go under the chin!” She picked 
up the basket and set it on Ethel’s head. 

It sat tippily in its place, rocking from side to side, 
until, with a sudden push, Alice jammed it down. Then 
it slipped over Ethel’s forehead and ears, until it covered 
her whole face and rested on her shoulders. 

Both of the little girls began to laugh, and Ethel told 
how funny everything looked from inside the basket: 
how it made everything look speckled with spots of 
light, and dim and shadowy, as it was in the grape- 
arbor. 

But in a little while they grew tired of the fun, and 
Ethel found it very warm inside the basket; so she tried 
to take it off; but it would not come off. Inside the bas- 
ket were the sharp ends of the hundreds of little twigs, 
of which it was made, all pointing upward. Whenever 
she tried to move the basket, the ends of the twigs 
caught in her hair and pricked her face. 

‘‘Oh, Alice,” she cried, “help me! I can’t get it off!” 

So Alice pulled and pushed, too; but more and more 
the sharp twigs caught and pricked, until Ethel was 
crying with the pain and Alice from fright; and still the 
basket would not move. 

But just then there was a sound of wheels in the door- 
yard and father’s loud voice calling, “Whoa!” to old 
Buster; and in a minute the whole family — father, and 
mother, and grandmother — came running in to see 
what was the matter. They found both children crying, 


THE INDIAN BASKET 


25 


Ethel still with the basket on her head, and Alice danc- 
ing up and down and shaking her hands in terror, and 
saying over and over again, ‘‘Oh, they’ll have to do it! 
they ’ll have to do it I ” 

In a minute mother’s quiet voice had soothed her into 
a gentle sobbing, and in the meantime father had taken 
his sharp knife from his pocket and carefully cut a long 
slit in the basket, and holding the edges of the slit 
apart, had lifted the basket from Ethel’s head. Then 
he said, “There, there! It’s all over. Now, don’t cry 
any more. What was it, Alice, that made you so fright- 
ened ? What was it you thought we should have to do.^” 

“Why, I never thought you could cut the basket,” 
answered Alice through her tears. “I thought the only 
thing you could do would be to cut Ethel’s head off.” 

The old basket still stands on the shelf, although no 
longer in grandmother’s room, for grandmother is not 
there now; but there is a long, ugly cut in one side of it. 
Alice and Ethel are quite grown up, and have gone 
away, and have little girls of their own; but when they 
go back to the old home and see the basket, they laugh 
about the time when, as Alice says, that cut saved 
Ethel’s life. 


A Son of the Mountains 

I N front of the two children stood something that 
was plainly alive, but so clumsy, so young, so help- 
less that it was hard to tell what it was. From one 
end of a round ball of yellow-and-white wool looked two 
lovely brown eyes. From the other end hung a fuzzy 
tail that was trying to wag only itself, but was really 
wagging the whole ball. 

‘‘ Oh, what is it ? Is he ours ? ” they cried together. 

And their father answered, with a smile, ‘‘Yes, he is 
yours. A new playmate who, if you are kind to him, will 
be a friend as long as he lives; for he comes of a noble 
family, which for five hundred years has had the love 
and the respect of the whole world.” 

So it was that the St. Bernard puppy came to his new 
home — a home blessed by two childish hearts that 
from the first regarded their new friend as little less 
than human, and, as the years passed, found little 
reason to change their faith. That night their father 
told them this story. 

“I said that his family is five hundred years old,” he 
began, “and I told you the truth. Between Italy and 
Switzerland is a great chain of mountains. Higher and 
higher they rise, till at last you come to a place where it 
is winter for nine months of the year; where there is no 
tree or shrub or blade of grass — only bare rocks and 


A SON OF THE MOUNTAINS 


27 

snow and ice. For nine months in the year the ice does 
not melt, and in the winter the snow is often forty or 
fifty feet deep — higher than the top of our house. 

‘‘Over that road, even in the winter, men go to find 
work; and sometimes, when the great storms come, they 
lose their way and lie down in the snow, where, if some- 
one does not find them, they die of the cold. 

“So it has always been. More than two thousand 
years ago men found their way over that part of the 
mountains, and made a road there; and even great 
armies, in shining breastplates and glittering steel caps, 
toiled slowly up, some of the men to find their way down 
the sunny slopes on the other side, and some to lie for- 
ever beneath the snow on the top. 

“And then, about a thousand years ago, a good monk 
who, it is said, had been a brave soldier himself, built a 
great stone house at the highest point of the road, and 
with other monks went there to live, so that, when the 
winter storms were fiercest, they might go out to find 
and help lost travelers buried in the snow. 

“For forty years the good monk did his work, and 
when he died others took it up, and it has gone on ever 
since. At first the monks worked alone; but by and by, 
nearly five hundred years ago now, they got some dogs 
and trained them to help. Because the dogs had so keen 
a sense of smell, they were able to find lost travelers 
that the monks might have missed. Every year they 
saved some lives; and so, ever since then there have been 
dogs at the Great St. Bernard Pass, always of the same 


28 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


kind, and all of them descended from those that the 
monks first took there. The puppy that I have brought 
you is one of that great family. 

‘‘The best-known member of the family was a won- 
derful dog named Barry. There is a monument to him 
near the place where he did his work, and where he died. 
It may seem strange to you to hear me speak of a dog’s 
work, but Barry did more to make him beloved than 
most men, for he saved the lives of thirty-nine persons; 
and, indeed, he died in trying to save another. A young 
officer had lost his way in a great storm, and had been 
covered by the snow. He was beginning to feel the 
drowsiness that creeps upon people who are freezing to 
death, when something began to paw the snow from 
about him, and a great hairy beast began to lick his 
face. He could think of nothing but a wolf, and in his 
fright he drew his sword and drove it into Barry’s heart. 
So died the most famous of all the St. Bernards. 

“But there is another story that the monks tell, less 
sad but not less strange. One night, at a time when 
there was not much travel over the pass, there came a 
knock on the door of the great stone house. The monk 
who went to the door found a group of rough-looking, 
ragged men who said they were cold and hungry. When 
they had been warmed and fed, and the monks were 
about to show them where they were to sleep, the 
strangers suddenly drew pistols and long knives and 
commanded that the treasure-chest be brought to them. 
The head of the household, thinking that if he did not 


A SON OF THE MOUNTAINS 


29 

obey all might be killed, sent one of the brothers to 
fetch it. 

“ In a little while he came back — but not alone, for 
with him were the dogs. At a word of command they 
leaped upon the robbers and bore them to the ground. 
Not one of them tried to tear a man, but the moment a 
robber made a motion to get up he found the great white 
teeth bared in his face; and so they had to lie still. 

“The monks bound the men and locked them in a 
cell, where they kept them safe till they were able to 
give them over to the law. 

“So you see your new playmate is the youngest of a 
very great family of dog noblemen. Treat him as his 
rank deserves.” 


The Family Garden 

W HEN the Monks family moved from the city to 
the country they were delighted to find that 
there was land enough round their new house 
to make a fine garden. That was what they had always 
wanted. 

‘‘We must hire a gardener,” said Father Monks, “a 
man who knows how to make a garden, so that we can 
have something to be proud of.” 

“ Oh, no, my dear,” said Mother Monks ; “ that would 
only be a garden that the gardener might be proud of. 
I think it would be much better to make a garden all 
by ourselves. There are so many of us that, if each one 
helps, I am sure we can make a beautiful garden; and 
when it has grown and people see it, they will think, not 
of a hired gardener, but of us.” 

“Very well,” said Father Monks, “we will do it that 
way, if you wish. You shall begin. Then Arabella and 
Violet and Viola shall add what they please, and after 
that John and Joseph and Peter and Samuel and Pansy 
may help; and when all the rest of you have done what 
you wish, I will add the finishing touches.” 

“Goody!” cried all the family together; and they 
went to bed happy about what they were going to do. 

Mother Monks began her part of the work the very 
next morning. First of all, she looked the ground over 


THE FAMILY GARDEN 


31 


carefully, and saw that, although there was a high hill 
on the other side of the road, their own land was quite 
flat. ‘H do not want anything fussy,” she said to her- 

O self. ‘‘The simplest thing is always the best. 
I will make just one large round bed.” So, with 
two stakes and the clothes-line, she drew a cir- 
cle in the back of the yard, and the boys helped her to 
spade it up and rake it over; and by night they had a 
beautiful, smooth flower-bed that looked like this. 

It was Arabella’s turn next, and she, too, looked 
the ground over carefully before she began. 

But it seemed to her that her mother’s plan was 
a good one, and as she could think of nothing 
better and there was still plenty of land to use, 
she, too, made a big round flower-bed, only hers 
was in the front; and when they had spaded it up and 
raked it smooth, the whole garden looked like this. 

“You have made a fine beginning,” said Father 
Monks, when he came home. “I am sure that if all of 
us do our part, we shall have such a garden as no one in 
this town ever saw before.” And all the other members 
of the Monks family thought so, too. 

Viola and Violet, the twins, could hardly wait to eat 
their breakfast the next morning before they began. 
They thought of many different things to do, but none 
of them seemed just right, until Viola had a happy 
thought. “Mother has a round bed, and Arabella has a 
round bed, too. Let us keep to the same idea. Since we 
are twins, we can both make round beds of the same 
size, and just alike.” 



32 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


So they did; and because when they were little they 
had slept in their mother’s bed, they made their flower- 
beds inside the big circle that their mother had 
laid out; and when they were done, the garden 
was so-fashion. 

Now John and Joseph, the other twins, had 
promised to help make the garden; but they 
were lazier than their sisters, and when they went to 
work the sun was hot, and they wanted to get over to the 
brook to see whether it was warm enough to go in swim- 
ming; and so, instead of making round beds of their own, 
they set out a few plants in their sister’s beds, in 
a space that was only about a quarter of a circle. 
Then they ran away to the brook; so that night 
the garden looked this way. 

When it came Peter’s turn to help, he wanted 
to do something different, but everything that he tried 
looked wrong. He made plans, and as quickly gave them 
up. The others had made circles or parts of circles; and 
at last, all he could think of was to set out two big plants 
in Arabella’s bed, and in front of them a row of 
other plants in a long, curved line, so that when 
Father Monks came home he saw something 
like this. 

Now Samuel Monks, unlike his two brothers, 
John and Joseph, was not lazy. He liked to dig, and did 
not care how hard he worked; so you can be sure that, 
when he began to make his part of the garden, it was 
bound to be good. Since all the others had made flower- 


THE FAMILY GARDEN 


33 


beds, he decided that for his part he would put a border 
round them. It was hard work, and long before he was 
done, his little back ached and there were 
blisters on his hands; but he felt well paid 
when his father came out and patted him on 
the back, and said, ‘‘Well done, my boy!” 
for the garden had grown to be like this 

It was now the turn of Pansy, the youngest of the 
family. Since she was not very strong, nobody thought 
that she could do much; but they all let her alone, be- 
cause this was to be a real family garden, in which each 
one not only was to have a part, but was to do just 
what he or she wished to do. 

When Pansy had walked round the garden five or 
six times, she had a happy thought. She saw that out- 
side the border that Samuel had made, there was still 
room for two more beds; and since her mother and her 
sisters had made round beds, she thought that she would 
show them that, although she was still 
only a little girl, she would some day be 
a woman like them; and so, after some 
thought and much measuring, she made 
two round beds just like theirs, one on 
each side of the border. And this is how the garden 
looked when she had finished. 

“It is fine, and I am proud of my family,” said Father 
Monks, as he walked round the garden that night; “but 
there is one thing you have forgotten. You have all 
made flower-beds or set out flowers. None of you have 




34 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


thought of the good things to eat that we might raise. 
It is for me to add the finishing touches.” 

Very proudly he went to work to fill all the side 
spaces between Ma Monks’s flower-bed and Arabella’s 
with tomato plants. 

When the last one was in the ground, Pa Monks stood 
up straight and rubbed his back, and said, ‘‘Now, my 
dears, the garden is done, and it is our garden. Each of 
us has helped to make it, and altogether it stands for 
the whole family, which a real garden should always do. 
And now, since it is a warm evening, let us all go up on 
the hill across the road and have our sup- 
per outdoors.” 

“Oh, good!” they all cried together. 
But when they were seated under the 
trees on the hill they happened to look 
across the road, to their own house, and the garden that 
they had made, and that now lay beneath them. This is 
what they saw. 

“Why, Simeon,” said Mrs. Monks, “we have done 
just what I wanted to do! We have made a garden 
that is really ours; it is a garden that is like us, and 
stands for the whole family.” 

“Yes,” said Mr. Monks, laughing, “it looks just like 
us. What more could we wish 



An Interrupted Vacation 

T he summer of Arthur’s eighth birthday his elder 
brother. Henry and some of his friends were to 
spend in a camp in the mountains; and the more 
Arthur heard about it, the more he wanted to go. 

When he first spoke about it, his mother said he was 
too young; but his father, after thinking it over for a 
day or two, told him, to his great joy, that he could go 
and stay one week. 

He was to start on a Monday; but on that morning 
word came that Uncle Joseph was sick, and his father 
and mother decided that they must go to him by the 
first train. 

It seemed as if Arthur would have to give up his trip, 
for the house must be locked, and there were other 
things to be done which it seemed hardly safe to intrust 
to a boy only eight years old. 

“Still,” said Mr. Hartwell, “I suppose he must learn 
some time. Perhaps he may as well begin now.” 

So after telling Arthur just how to close the house, his 
father and mother started on their journey, and he was 
left alone. 

He was up very early the next morning, and after he 
had eaten the breakfast that had been laid out for him, 
he locked and bolted the back door, closed all the blinds 
on the south side of the house, made sure that he had 


36 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


his tickets in hisipocket, -and carried his bundle out on 
the verandah. He was just going to lock the front door 
when, suddenly, Peter came running through the hall. 

Now Peter is the cat — Arthur’s special pet and 
friend. No one had thought of him — how he was to get 
in and out, or what he was to eat and drink while the 
family was away. 

Arthur had to think quickly, for it was nearly time 
for his train to leave. He decided that the best plan 
would be to leave the back-chamber window open, and 
put food and drink on the kitchen floor. Peter often got 
into the house by climbing the grape-trellis and leap- 
ing in at the second-story window. It would be safer 
to leave that open than to leave open a window in the 
cellar or on the first floor, where someone might see it. 

Arthur opened the chamber window and put a basin 
of water on the kitchen floor and a saucer of milk beside 
it. Then he ran over to the butcher’s and got ten cents’ 
worth of fresh meat, and left it with the milk and the 
water. Also he soaked a dozen crackers and left them in 
another dish. That, he thought, would last Peter a week, 
even if he caught no mice. 

As Arthur opened the outside door to go to the sta- 
tion, he was startled by a loud bang! which sounded 
almost like a gun. It made him jump, but when he saw 
that it was only a chamber door that the wind had 
slammed, he laughed, and went out and locked the front 
door after him. • 

The first two days in camp were full of happiness. 


AN INTERRUPTED VACATION 


37 


How good everything tasted, and how pleasant it was 
to sleep on a sweet-smelling bed of hemlock boughs! 
And what fish there were to be caught! It was not until 
the second evening that Arthur even thought of Peter. 
Then the cracker he was eating made him wonder how 
his little four-footed friend was getting on. 

Suddenly he remembered the bang of that door. Oh, 
why had he not thought of it before! It must have been 
the back-chamber door which had closed, and that was 
the room which Peter would have to enter. With the 
door closed, he could not get downstairs, could not get 
at his food, could not get anything to drink. Even now 
he must have been two days without a mouthful. 

Arthur knew that he had not money enough to go 
back and return to camp again. If he went home, he 
would have to stay there. All his fun would be cut short. 
But it seemed as if all the time he could see poor Peter, 
looking thin and hungry, and could hear him calling. 

By morning he made up his mind. Sadly he packed 
his things, and the first train carried him back to town. 
He grew anxious to get back. 

Just as he was putting the key in the lock of the front 
door he heard a loud ‘^Miau!” and Peter, thin and wild- 
eyed, came running round the house. As soon as the 
door was open, he dashed in, tore through the hall to the 
kitchen, and seized a piece of meat. He was so hungry 
that he even growled a little when Arthur tried to pet 
him. 

The rest of that week was a hard time for Arthur. 



But Peter would come and rub lovingly against him and purr 
like a little spinning-wheel. 


AN INTERRUPTED VACATION 


39 


His parents were still away, and he was obliged to stay 
with a neighbor. But Peter would come and push his 
head under Arthur’s arm, and rub lovingly against him, 
and purr like a little spinning-wheel; and in the feeling 
that he had saved his little friend from suffering, Arthur 
found his comfort. 


Phcebe Ann’s Christmas Tree 

O N a point of land that stretches far out into the 
sea and ends in a great rock, there stands a tall 
white lighthouse. At the foot of the lighthouse, 
and cuddled close up to it, as if to keep warm in the 
cold winds that roar in from the ocean, is a white house, 
built very strong of great stones, and some other little 
buildings in which are kept a boat and barrels of oil and 
other things needed by the lighthouse-keeper and his 
family. 

The great rock is high and bare. Not a tree, or even 
a blade of grass, grows upon it, but all round is the sea; 
and sometimes, in the winter storms, the great waves 
dash against it till the spray reaches almost to the 
light. The waves seem like a pack of white wolves climb- 
ing up and up, to tear the keeper from his little room. 

It is only at certain times that one can get from the 
lighthouse to the mainland. When the keeper has a man 
with him to help him launch the boat, he can row across 
the bay; but at other times the only way is to walk 
across the narrow neck of land that connects the point 
with the mainland, and is covered with water except 
when the tide is very low and the sea is perfectly quiet. 
Sometimes there are weeks when no one can reach the 
shore. 

For a long time the keeper’s little daughter, Phoebe 



It blew so hard that the water swept clear across the point, and it 
looked as if Santa Claus could not get out to the lighthouse. 


42 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


Ann, had been looking forward to Christmas, and count- 
ing the days. There were so many things that she 
wanted that she had not dared to tell Santa Claus of 
all of them, but she had finally made up her mind about 
those that she wanted most, and had written Santa 
Claus two letters about them. She had left the letters 
on the mantelpiece when she went to bed, and in the 
morning they were gone. So he must have got them. 
Phoebe Ann had had no answer, and was a little afraid 
something had gone wrong; but her father told her that 
Santa Claus was always so busy, especially just before 
Christmas, that he seldom had time to answer letters. 
He thought the old gentleman would come on time if 
the weather was not too bad. 

But the weather was bad all Christmas week, — so 
bad that Phoebe Ann’s father could not get over to the 
mainland, — and the day before Christmas was the 
worst of all. It blew so hard that the water swept clear 
across the point, even at low tide, and it looked as if 
Santa Claus could not get out to the lighthouse. 

Early in the morning the keeper and his family had 
seen a great ship coming up the coast. It was plain that 
she was having a hard time in the high seas and strong 
head wind, and so they were not surprised when, about 
noon, she came to anchor a little way out, in the shelter 
of the point. But they were very much surprised a little 
later to see a boat with six or seven men in it put off 
from the ship and start in toward the light. They 
watched it a§ it tossed on the waves like a cork, then 


PHCEBE ANN’S CHRISTMAS TREE 43 

dropped down again out of sight, till they thought it 
was lost; but all the time it kept coming nearer, until 
at last the keeper ran down to the landing, and helped 
the men pull the boat up. 

They had come for help. The ship was just home 
from China and the East Indies. The captain had been 
taken sick, and was very weak and low, and the officer 
in charge of the boat had come to see if he could get some 
fresh, nourishing food for him. 

While the lighthouse-keeper and the officer went up 
to the house, Phoebe Ann stayed down by the boat and 
talked with the sailors. She told them about the letters 
she had written to Santa Claus, and how much afraid 
she was that he could not get to the lighthouse now. 
But the sailors cheered her up. They said that perhaps, 
instead of coming with his team of reindeer, he would 
put on his diving-suit and swim out. They said he had 
web-feet and could swim like a fish, anyway; and even 
if he did not get there just on time, he would probably 
send the things later, and she must not mind a little 
waiting. 

Phoebe Ann stayed by the boat until her father and 
the officer came back, carrying two live chickens and a 
basket of eggs and some vegetables. Then the boat 
rowed back to the ship, and Phoebe Ann went into the 
house to help her mother. There was a good deal to do 
that day in getting ready for the Christmas dinner, so 
Phoebe Ann did not know that the boat came back 
again and left a big box on the landing, which her father 


44 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


covered with an old sail and brought up to the house 
that evening, after dark. She went to bed early, rather 
sad, because she was sure now that Santa Claus could 
not come. 

But oh, the next morning! Phoebe Ann jumped out 
of bed and rushed into the dining-room, where she had 
hung her stocking by the chimney. The stocking was 
gone, but there were two stockings, both very fat and 
bunchy, hanging on the funniest little Christmas tree, 
which stood in a great green pot. It was not like a com- 
mon Christmas tree, but had big, thick, rubbery green 
leaves. 

From branch to branch stretched strings of pop-corn, 
and here and there were little sparks of fire, from sticks 
that burned only at the end, and sent up a delicious, 
sweet smell. On one limb was a little gray goose that 
danced up and down and flapped its wings gently. On 
another was a brown monkey, hanging by one hand and 
holding a little dish in the other. At the foot of the tree 
was a pile of funny nuts, all hubbly on the outside, but 
very sweet and chewy inside. There were two beautiful 
fans, and three funny Japanese dolls, with slanting black 
eyes and a queer little topknot of hair; and there were 
beautiful things to make dresses for the dolls. Last of 
all, and most astonishing, was a letter from Santa Claus 
himself, saying that he just happened to be coming up 
the coast on the China ship, and had stopped to leave 
the things before he went ashore. 

“Just to think, papa,” said Phoebe Ann, at dinner, 


PHCEBE ANN’S CHRISTMAS TREE 45 


‘‘how wonderful it is that Santa Claus should come just 
in time, on that ship!” 

“Yes,” said her father, “Santa Claus is one of the 
most wonderful things in the world.” 


The Little Water People 

U NCLE ZEB was sitting by the kitchen fire, with 
Jessie on one knee and Tom on the other. 
There was a roaring fire in the stove, and by 
and by the big teakettle began to sing. 

At first it was a soft, low humming, then it rose to a 
sweet little song that sounded like someone whistling 
away off in the distance; and it kept getting louder and 
louder, as if the whistler were coming nearer; and then 
it was almost like a scream, and the cover of the kettle 
began to bob up and down. 

It was such a funny noise that Tom and Jessie both 
laughed. 

‘‘What makes the kettle sing that way.^ Why does 
it make that noise asked Jessie. 

“That,” said Uncle Zeb, “is the Little Water People 
asking to be let out.” 

“The Little Water People!” cried both the children 
together. ‘ ‘ Who are they ? Do they live in the teakettle ? 
We never heard of them before.” 

“Well,” said Uncle Zeb, “I can’t tell you what they 
look like, because nobody has ever seen them; but we 
know they are there because we see what they do. 

“They are very funny Little People — so small that 
hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of them can live 
in a teaspoonful of water and have plenty of room.” 


THE LITTLE WATER PEOPLE 


47 


‘‘Do they always live in the water?” asked Jessie. 

“Yes, always in the water. When it is cold, they 
keep perfectly still. They never sing or talk or shout 
then. But when the water begins to get hot, then the 
Little People rush round every way, trying to get out. 

“If they find they are shut in, they begin to sing a 
little song, all together, in a tiny, piping voice: ‘Oh, 
please let us out! It’s very warm in here. Please let us 
out!’ That song is pretty to hear, because all the 
people are polite, and say please. 

“But in a little while, if you don’t do anything, they 
begin to shout in a louder voice: ‘Let us out! Let us 
out! Let us out! Let us out!’ And then the Little 
People begin to scream and climb up on each other’s 
shoulders, and jump over one another to get out. 

“A few of them squeeze through under the lid of the 
teakettle, and others come through the spout; but they 
can’t get out fast enough that way. They are like the 
boys over at Tommy’s school, when they all try to get 
through the door at the same time.” 

“But what if you don’t let them out? What do they 
do then?” 

“Well, they all bend their heads down, and get their 
backs and shoulders against the under side of the cover, 
and press hard with their hands; and then they give a 
great shout and push all together, and lift the lid a little 
way. And every time they do that a lot of them get out.” 

“They are doing it now!” cried Jessie, eagerly, as the 
kettle cover bobbed up and down. 


48 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


‘‘Are they good or bad people?” asked Tommy. 

“They are good,” his uncle answered, “ so long as they 
are shut up in strong iron prison-houses, where they 
cannot get out; then they will work hard day and night. 
They are so strong when they work together, that they 
can do more than a thousand men. It is these Little 
People of the Water who pull all the big trains of cars 
and push all the steamboats.” 

“I wish I could see them or catch some of them,” 
said Tommy. And before Uncle Zeb could stop him, he 
had stretched his hand out to the teakettle cover. He 
drew it back very quickly. 

“Yes,” said Uncle Zeb, “they are good, so long as 
they are shut up; but when we get in their way they 
bite.” 


Curing Rosa May 

O N the morning when Bessie Norton was six 
years old, she came down to breakfast to find 
a long box all tied up in pink paper, with a 
string that was like a little gold chain. The box stood 
on the table by Bessie’s plate, and there was a card on 
it, with some writing. Bessie could read print, if the 
words were not too long, but she had not yet learned to 
read writing; so she ran to her mother with the card and 
asked her to read it. 

‘‘It says, ‘For Bessie, with best wishes for many 
happy birthdays,’” said mother; and then she helped 
to untie the gold string and take off the pink paper. 

When at last the box was open, there appeared the 
most beautiful paper doll that Bessie had ever seen. 
It had lovely golden hair, curling in little ringlets all 
over its head, and its' eyes were large and blue, and its 
cheeks like blush roses, and with it were all kinds of 
beautiful dresses. There was a light pink one for parties, 
with a hat to match, and a plain dark-blue sailor suit 
for everyday wear, and two dainty white ones to dress 
up in in the afternoon. Each one had a hat to go with 
it, and there were also lots of dainty lace underclothes, 
and two hand-bags and a parasol. 

Bessie was so happy that she could hardly wait to eat 
her breakfast. As soon as it was over she took the beau- 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


50 

tiful doll, and went with her to the house of her play- 
mate, Nellie Baker, who lived next door. All that day 
the two played together with Rosa May under the trees; 
and in the afternoon they gave a party, because, you see, 
it was Rosa May’s birthday just as much as it was 
Bessie’s. 

Many other days they played together, too, and Rosa 
May always had the best of care, and was taken into 
the house and put to bed at the right hour. But at last 
there came a day when a band came marching by, play- 
ing beautifully, while Bessie was dressing Rosa May. 
She ran out to the fence, and then followed a little 
way down the street, and when she came back her 
mother called her in to supper, and poor Rosa May was 
forgotten. 

It rained hard all that night, but of course Bessie did 
not know it, for she was asleep. But the next morning 
she looked everywhere for Rosa May, and could not find 
her. At last she went out under the trees, and there she 
found the poor doll, where she had lain all night in the 
rain. 

It was a sad, sad sight. One blue eye was all washed 
out, and the other was nearly gone. Her right arm was 
doubled back and broken, both legs were all twisted, so 
Rosa May could never stand up straight again, and in 
place of the pretty rosy lips there was only a great ugly 
red mark. 

Bessie sat down beside her dear Rosa May and began 
to cry. Of course she could not help it. No little girl 


CURING ROSA MAY 


SI 


could. She cried so hard that she did not hear the sound 
of footsteps coming nearer, and did not know there was 
anyone about until a pleasant voice said, ‘‘My! my! 
little girl, what is the trouble.^” The voice came from 
a pleasant-faced young man, who had a little box, like a 
trunk, in one hand, and a big light-colored umbrella and 
a bundle of sticks under his arm. 

Bessie showed him her poor Rosa May, through her 
tears. 

He took the doll tenderly in his hands, and said, 
“Well, well, she has met with a very bad accident, I 
see, but I think perhaps I can cure her.” 

“Oh, can you.^” cried Bessie. “Are you a doctor.^” 

The young man laughed. “Yes,” he said, “I think I 
can cure this patient if you will let me operate just as I 
think best.” 

“Oh, yes, sir!” cried Bessie. “You can, if you will 
only cure Rosa May!” 

The young man took out a little pair of scissors, and 
then opened his box and found some smooth, stiff white 
cardboard. Then he took poor Rosa May and cut her 
head right off! Bessie almost cried right out at that; 
but the young man was smiling so pleasantly that she 
did not. He took the cardboard and cut out a new 
head, just like the old one, and then with a little glue 
from his box he fastened it on to Rosa May’s body, so 
that you could hardly see the place. Next there came 
out of the wonderful box a bundle of little tubes of 
paint, some of which he mixed in a small china pan; 



In a few minutes the new face had two big blue eyes and a 
rosebud mouth and curly, golden hair and a pair of pink 
cheeks. 


CURING ROSA MAY 


S3 


and in a few minutes the new face had two big blue eyes 
and a rosebud mouth and curly, golden hair and a pair 
of pink cheeks — just as Rosa May had had at first. 

By this time Bessie was so happy that she was danc- 
ing up and down; and when the young man cut off one 
arm and both legs of Rosa May, she did not mind at all, 
because she knew he would make new ones as good as 
the others had been at first. And he did, so that no one 
would ever have known that Rosa May had ever had 
any accident or been sick. 

Bessie thanked him over and over again. She asked 
him if he was going to doctor someone else, and he 
laughed and said no, he was going to paint a picture. 
As he turned away he said, ‘‘You must be careful not to 
leave Rosa May out at night again, for young children 
like her take cold, and sometimes you can’t get a doctor 
who knows how to cure them.” 


On Salt-Water Ice 

B illy PENFIELD stood on the doorstep of his 
house, and looked at the frozen river. In his hand 
he held a note that his mother had told him to 
take to Mrs. Miller, who lived two miles down the road. 
His mother had expected him to walk, but as Billy 
looked at the river he began to think of his skates. 
With them he could go and come much quicker. So, 
going quietly back into the house, he got his skates, and 
slipped as quietly out again, and went down the bank 
to the river. 

Now, Billy knew as well as anyone that the river at 
Weldon is salt, and for several miles above the town, 
too. He knew that salt water does not freeze so quickly 
as fresh water. In fact, it was not often that anyone 
tried to skate between Weldon and Bramfield, for it was 
not regarded as safe. But this year it had been different. 
The cold weather had made ice that seemed very hard 
and thick, and for several days Billy had seen skaters 
passing up and down in front of his house. So he made 
up his mind to try it. 

For a little while everything went well — so well that 
Billy did not notice how warm the day was. Instead of 
being sharp, like the week that had gone before, it was 
milder, and there was a misty softness in the air. The 
skate-tracks were easy to follow, and Billy kept along 


ON SALT-WATER ICE 


ss 


where other skaters had passed, although it took him 
nearer to the middle of the stream than he had meant 
to go. 

He had skated about half a mile when suddenly, with- 
out any warning, his right foot broke through the ice 
far enough to wet his ankle. He was going fast, and 
as the ice under his left foot held firm, he was neither 
stopped nor thrown down. 

But the mishap frightened him. He did not know 
that salt-water ice gives no warning, no sound of crack- 
ing before it breaks, but merely drops away under your 
feet. If he had known that, he would have been more 
frightened. 

As quickly as he could, he turned in toward the bank, 
but still went on up-river. He had taken hardly a 
dozen strokes when there came again that terrible feel- 
ing of standing on nothing. He felt himself going, and 
this time both feet went in. What he did then he must 
have done in the least little part of a second — so 
quickly that it did not seem to him that he thought to 
do it at all, but only did it; and it was the only thing 
that could have saved his life. As he felt himself drop- 
ping through, he bent the upper part of his body for- 
ward, like a half-opened jack-knife, so that he found 
himself up to his waist in the icy water, but with all of 
his body above the waist lying flat on the edge of the 
ice, and his arms spread out as far as he could reach. 

For a moment he lay there panting with fear, and 
then, very slowly and very carefully, he began to draw 


S6 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


himself out, but with no quick motions, and without 
moving his hands an inch nearer the edge of the hole. 

When at last he found himself once more out on the 
ice, he did the very best thing that he could have done: 
he lay still, face down, without trying to get up, and 
with his arms still spread out. Then, lifting one foot 
after the other enough to dig the toes of his skates into 
the ice, he began to kick himself along toward the shore. 

It was slow work, and it hurt his knees and made his 
toes ache, and he was shivering with the cold; but never 
once did he try to stand up or to draw his arms in 
toward his body, till his head bumped against the rough 
cakes of ice that the tides had piled along the bank. 
Then, at last, he knew that he was safe, and he stood up. 

Over the rough ice he climbed as quickly as he could, 
and with fingers numb with cold, took off his skates. 
He left them where they lay, and started on the run for 
Mrs. Miller’s. There, in front of a great blaze in the 
fireplace, he was soon warm and dry enough to go home. 


The Little Path 

O NE mornirjg, a few weeks after Mr. Milliken had 
moved his family to the farm he had bought 
for a summer home, he was walking slowly up 
to the house from the front gate when he saw for the 
first time a funny little path. 

Instead of running along beside the driveway, it ran 
right across it, and then up across the lawn; and as 
Mr. Milliken looked at it he wondered why anyone 
should want to go back and forth there so often as to 
make a path through the grass. 

When he reached the house, he spoke to Harold and 
Jessie about it. You must n’t get into the habit of go- 
ing back and forth across the lawn that way, my dears,” 
he said. ‘‘ It wears away the grass and does n’t look well.” 

‘‘Why, papa,” cried Jessie, “we have n’t been across 
the lawn at all in any one place!” 

And Harold, too, said, “We have n’t, papa, really.” 
Mr. Milliken thought that was strange, but he said no 
more until a few days later, when he happened to pass 
that way again and noticed that the little path showed 
more plainly than before. It looked deeper and was 
worn smoother. So he said again, “ Children, are you 
sure you are not making that path across the lawn? 
Is n’t there some game that you play there that you 
may have forgotten about?’’ 


58 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


No, they were sure they had not played there at all, 
and they knew nothing about the little path. But after 
their father had spoken to them the second time, they 
went out to see what he meant. 

They found a curious little track, or trail, about as 
wide as Harold’s two hands, running right up across 
the lawn and disappearing in the orchard beyond. 
They could follow it easily until they got up among the 
apple trees, but there they lost it. 

‘‘Let’s see if there is another end to it,” said Jessie. 
So they followed the path back until they reached the 
driveway. Here, of course, the hard gravel showed no 
signs except the marks of the wheels, but Harold sud- 
denly gave a little shout of delight, and pointed to the 
bank on the other side of the driveway. There the little 
path began again, and showed even more plainly. It 
went right up over one side of the bank and down the 
other, and the children, following it, found that it led 
down to the edge of the brook and ended there. 

The more they thought about it the stranger it 
seemed. What could have made the path, and what 
could be using it now.^ For it was easy to see that 
whatever had made it was still passing back and forth 
over it every day. 

They talked it over with their father and mother, 
but neither could give them any help. Then they went 
out to the stable and told Eben, the hired man, about it. 
When he had finished oiling the harness, he went with 
the children and looked the little path over carefully. 


THE LITTLE PATH 


59 


Then he said, quite seriously, “I think I know the fel- 
low that made this path — or rather the fellows, for 
there must be several of them. How would you like to 
watch for them to-night.^” 

‘‘ Oh, lovely ! ” cried the children ; and they could hardly 
wait until darkness fell and Eben was ready to take them 
out. 

Before they started Eben made them promise to keep 
perfectly still while they watched, and neither to move 
nor to speak so much as a single word, even in a whisper. 
Then he took down the big lantern with a reflector, 
which was always placed by the stable-door, to light the 
driveway. He placed it in a large wooden box, over 
which he threw a blanket, and wrapped Jessie and Har- 
old in two other blankets; then they all went out and 
lay down in the edge of the orchard, some distance from 
the little path, and prepared for a long wait. 

It was very dark and very still. The katydids in the 
maples overhead kept answering back and forth, and 
now and then a frog croaked by the brook; but for the 
most part it was so quiet that Harold could hear his 
own heart beat. 

Suddenly, when it seemed as if they had been there 
for hours, Jessie thought she saw a shadow slipping along 
the little path. She watched it closely and was sure it 
was something alive and moving. It would go along a 
little way and then stop, and then go a little farther 
and stop again. 

Then Eben pinched her arm gently and touched 


6o 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


Harold on the shoulder, and both children could see him 
point at the moving shadow; but they remembered their 
promise not to move or speak, and kept perfectly still. 
They watched and seemed scarcely to breathe. 

Not until the shadow had disappeared in the deeper 
shade of the orchard trees did Eben make any move. 
Then all at once he drew the blanket from the front of 
the box, and a wide space under the early sweet-apple 
tree was lighted by the rays of the big lantern with its 
brilliant reflector. And in that space, sitting up like a 
little educated dog, or a squirrel, sat a big gray musk- 
rat, holding a yellow apple in his forepaws, and gnawing 
at it. 

The light of the lantern came so suddenly and was 
so bright, that for. a moment the muskrat was dazed 
and too much surprised to move; but then, dropping his 
apple as if he had suddenly decided that he did not like 
apples, anyway, he made a dash down the little path, 
and plop ! they heard him go head first into the brook. 

“That is the fellow that made the path — he and his 
family,” said Eben. “I thought so. Muskrats are very 
fond of sweet apples.” 


How Christmas Came at Midsummer 

I N the big, clean room, with its two rows of iron beds, 
the little boy had been lying a long, long time. At 
first he had tried to count the days, but somewhere 
in the second week he had lost the count, and had never 
found it again. All he could remember was that there 
had been snow on the ground when they had picked him 
up and carried him into the big white room. He knew 
that the snow must be gone now, for when the nurse 
raised him and put the two pillows under his head, he 
could look out into the yard and see the tops of trees, 
and the leaves on them were thick and green; and all day 
long, whether he was lying down or sitting up, he could 
hear birds singing. And besides, it had grown so hot! 

When he could not sleep for the heat, the nurse would 
come and lay a cool hand on his forehead; and if that 
did not help him, she would say, “Well, I guess we shall 
have to get the bee.” Then in a little while she would 
come in with something that looked like a big cage with 
a great black-and-yellow bee in it; and when she had 
set it on the table, she would put her finger to it and the 
bee would begin to fly round and round the cage with a 
low, soft humming. Then the air would grow cooler. 
A gentle breeze would begin to blow, and the little boy 
would find it easier to lie still; and by and by his eyes 
would close, and almost before he knew it he would be 


62 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


asleep. But when he woke, the bee was always gone 
and the air was hot again. 

Every morning the big doctor came to talk with him 
a little while, and every afternoon the other doctor 
came. But one day the big doctor came a second time 
just before dark, and brought two strange doctors with 
him. They sat a long time by the bed, and watched the 
little boy and held his hands and listened at his breast, 
as if they had thought there was something inside him 
that could speak. Then they began to talk together, 
and before they had finished talking the little boy’s 
father and mother came in. 

It seemed to the little boy that something must be 
troubling them, for they did not smile at him as usual; 
but instead, his mother came over and knelt by the cot 
and put her arms round him and said, ‘‘Dearest, what 
can we do to make you well again Is there anything 
that you want that we can get for you.^ Tell mother 
what it is.” 

The little boy looked at her with the big, deep eyes 
that seemed always to be wishing for something, and 
said, “ I want Christmas. Can’t you make it Christmas 
for me now, mamma 

“Christmas.^ Why, dearest, what a strange wish! 
Christmas does not come in midsummer, but only when 
it is cold and there is snow on the ground. Mother can- 
not make Christmas come now, dear. You must be a 
good boy and wait.” 

“ But I have been a good boy and I have waited — so 


CHRISTMAS AT MIDSUMMER 


63 


long! — and it has n’t come. It seems as if I could n’t 
wait any more.” And then, as the little boy looked at 
his mother, he saw that she was crying, and wondered 
why. 

The big doctor went over and laid his hand on her 
shoulder. ‘‘Perhaps the little boy is right,” he said 
gently. “He felt that he could not wait, and has put his 
case into other hands than ours — into better hands; 
and he shall have his wish.” Then, turning to the little 
boy himself, he said, “Your mother did not know that I 
can make Christmas come whenever I please, but I can, 
for Santa Claus is an old, old friend of mine. Whenever 
I send for him he comes, even if he is at the North Pole. 
I shall send for him to-night. To-morrow you will see 
him, and it will be Christmas, for it is always Christ- 
mas where Santa Claus is.” 

Then he pressed the little boy’s hand, and all the doc- 
tors and the little boy’s father and mother went out. 

That night the bee sang the little boy to sleep again; 
but it seemed to him that, as he lay there, people kept 
moving softly about his bed — people who slipped back 
and forth like shadows, without a sound. But the bee 
droned on and on, and he did not wake. 

It was the sound of voices that made him open his 
eyes at last — the voices of people singing. And as he 
looked round him it seemed to him that the great room 
had grown smaller in the night. The walls now came 
close up round the bed, and from somewhere just 
beyond the wall came the sound of voices singing, — 


64 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


“O little town of Bethlehem, 

How still we see thee lie! 

Above thy deep and dreamless sleep 
The silent stars go by. 

Yet in thy dark streets shineth 
The everlasting Light; 

The hopes and fears of all the years 
Are met in thee to-night.” 

The little boy knew the song, for always on Christ- 
mas Eve they had taken him from his bed at midnight 
and carried him to the window; and, looking down, he 
had seen men and women standing in the street, singing 
that song. So he knew that Christmas had really come, 
as the big doctor had said it would. 

As the singing ended, a part of the wall near the bed 
seemed to slip back out of the way, and in its place 
stood a Christmas tree — a wonderful tree, heavy with 
apples and oranges and candy and chains of pop-corn, 
and things that twinkled like stars, and other things 
that glowed like fire. At the foot of the tree stood a sled, 
and beside it a red wagon. There were other gifts, too, 
that come only at Christmas — a box of tools, and many 
soldiers marching all one way, not looking at all at the 
little boy, but straight ahead. 

Before the little boy had had time to see all the things, 
he heard a noise on the other side of the bed; and as he 
looked, the wall slipped aside and Santa Claus stood 
before him. He was dressed all in red, as he always is, 
and his long white beard twinkled with frost and snow; 
but under the big fur cap and the bushy eyebrows the 



When the big doctor came that day the little hoy was sleeping. 
By his side lay the skates and the little ship. 


66 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


little boy could see two kind blue eyes that looked just 
like the big doctor’s. 

‘‘Little boy,” said Santa Claus very softly, “I have 
come a long, long way to see you and bring you your 
Christmas — all the way from the North Pole. Are you 
glad?” 

The little boy looked up into his face with eyes round 
with wonder but sparkling like stars. “ Oh, yes, sir ! ” he 
said, “I am — I am — so glad — so — ” Then, all at 
once, he put his arms over his face and began to cry. 

Santa Claus stood a little while by the bed, watching 
him, very still. Then he reached over to the tree and 
took down the pair of skates and a little ship, and laid 
them on the bed beside the little boy, and slipped away 
without a word. 

When the big doctor came that day, the little boy was 
sleeping. By his side still lay the skates, and one hand 
hugged the tiny ship. He was sleeping as he had not 
slept before since they had brought him into the big 
white room. The doctor did not try to wake him, but 
merely bent above the cot a moment and listened. Then 
he rose, tall and erect, and, looking straight ahead, he 
said to the nurse, “ Come. All is well with the little boy 
now.” And they both went out on tiptoe. 


Grandfather’s Nickname 

G randfather bartlett’s first name was 

Jonathan, but one of his brothers, and two or 
three old men who had known him all their lives, 
would sometimes call him ‘‘Wolf.” It used to seem very 
strange to the grandchildren; but one day their grand- 
mother told them this story: — 

“ It began way back when grandfather was only five 
years old, and his father and mother started, with thirty 
other families, to cross the great plains and make new 
homes for themselves where land was free and the farm- 
ing was easier. 

“They traveled in great covered wagons drawn by 
two or three yoke of oxen, and all together made up a 
train nearly half a mile long. Under the wagons, swing- 
ing from the axles, hung the kettles and pots and pans 
in which they cooked their meals by the open camp- 
fires; and all day long, as the slow oxen plodded through 
the dust, you could hear the kettles go cling! clang! 
tink! tank! as they struck against one another. 

“Sometimes they slept in the big wagons; but when 
it was pleasant and not too cold, the blankets were 
spread on the ground, with the big wagons backed into 
a circle like a fence round about the camp, and the men 
taking turns in keeping awake to see that no Indians 
crept up, and that wolves did not get the cattle. 


68 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


“But often after supper, as you sat by the blazing 
fire, somewhere out of the darkness beyond the ring of 
wagons a sound would rise that made you feel creepy 
all over, and like snuggling close to your father — a 
wild, high-sounding howl, now rising, now falling; seem- 
ing now to come from one side, now from the other. 
And pretty soon another howl like it would begin, and 
then another, until there were more than you could 
count, and you shivered, and were glad when Captain 
Lane stirred up the fire. 

“ It was funny to see old Shep when the howling be- 
gan. The first time he heard it, he began to bark with 
all his might, and rushed out between two wagons, into 
the darkness; but in a few minutes there was a quick 
thump of feet, and back he came, on the jump, whining, 
with his tail between his legs. But the men in the camp 
said they liked to hear the howling, because they knew 
that as long as it kept up there were no creeping Indi- 
ans about. 

“So the long days went by, until one evening when 
they made camp a little earlier than usual because they 
had found a good spring of water. The day before that 
had been grandfather’s fifth birthday, and one of the 
hunters in the party had made him a whistle from the 
leg-bone of an antelope; and so, on this evening, instead 
of playing with the other children, he had taken his 
whistle and gone off by himself. 

“He walked a long way, and when he turned to go 
back he could not see any camp or hear any voices; but 


GRANDFATHER’S NICKNAME 69 

he knew that the wagons could not be far away, and so 
he kept walking. 

‘‘By and by the sun dropped out of sight and it began 
to grow dark, and still there was no camp. The little 
five-year-old boy was tired and hungry, and began to 
be afraid. He sat down in a little hollow in the prairie 
and cried; but no one came, for no one heard him. And 
then, after what seemed a long time, it began to be light 
again, and he saw that the great round moon was peep- 
ing over, the edge of the hollow in which he sat. 

“ But also on the edge of the hollow, right beside the 
moon, sat something else — something that looked like 
old Shep. The little boy called to him, ‘Come, Shep! 
Nice doggy! nice old Shep!’ but the thing did not come. 
Instead, it stood up and backed away. The little boy 
stood up, too, and started to run toward the dog; but 
the strange dog did not wait, as Shep would have done, 
but turned and slipped away. In a few minutes it was 
back again, sitting just where it had sat before; and a 
little at one side sat another, just like it. 

“The little boy put the bone whistle to his lips and 
blew it hard. Both of the gray figures on the edge of 
the hollow jumped so quickly that they almost fell over 
backward. That made the boy laugh, and he blew again, 
and turned round to see if the strange dogs were any- 
where in sight. Behind him one of them was just coming 
back. It sat down on the edge of the hollow and watch- 
ed, and the full moon, shining on its eyes, made them 
look big and green. He turned round again, and there 


70 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


sat the other two, just where he had seen them at first; 
and then another came, and another, until there were 
five. 

‘‘And then, all at once and all together, they began to 
make the long, long howl that he had so often heard in 
the cozy camp; and he saw that they held their heads 
high in the air and their noses pointed to the sky, and 
that they were singing together the song that had made 
him feel so creepy and nestle up to his father. He knew, 
then, that they were not dogs, but wolves. 

“He tried to cry, but the whistle was in his mouth, 
and he made only a funny little noise. The wolves 
stopped singing and stood up. He blew again, this time 
with all his might. They ran back a few steps. Once 
more he sounded the whistle, now in little toots, now in 
a long, high squeal; and then, almost before he knew it, 
the gray shapes on the edge of the hollow were gone, and 
he saw flashes of light, and heard the crack of pistols 
and the cries of men and the sound of galloping horses. 
And down the side of the hollow, bounding and barking, 
came Shep himself. 

“The next thing that grandfather knew, his father 
had him in his arms, on horseback, and they were gal- 
loping back to camp. So that is why they gave him the 
nickname of ‘Wolf’ Bartlett.” 


Lemonade Sandy 

S ANDY was yellow. His small ears hung down most 
of the time, but they stood up sharply when you 
spoke to him. His hair was stiff and wiry, and 
grew so thick round his face and eyes that it looked like 
whiskers. The first time Mr. Tolman saw him, he said, 
‘‘He looks like a Scotchman. You should call him 
Sandy.” So that is how he got his name. 

No one knew where he came from. Don Furber found 
him on the doorstep one morning. When Don came 
out, the dog wagged his stumpy tail and looked up, as if 
to say, “Good morning! This is a fine day. What shall 
we do?” And all day long they played together — Don 
and the dog and the other children in the street. At 
noon they gave him a bone, with plenty of meat on it, 
and he ate it quietly and thankfully, like a gentleman. 
He followed Don home that night, but did not attempt 
to go into the house. Instead, he curled up under the 
lilac-bush by the back door and went to sleep. 

But the next morning, instead of being on Don’s door- 
step, he was on Lewis Norton’s; and to Lewis, too, he 
seemed to say, “Good morning! This is a fine day. 
What shall we do?” 

And that is how Sandy came to Kay Street. Some- ' 
times he stayed at one house, sometimes at another, 
but all day he played with the children. Some one 


72 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


always fed him, an honored guest, first at one house, then 
at another, until everybody on the street grew to know 
and like him. 

And then one hot day a wagon came into the street — 
a wagon painted black, with iron bars across the back 
of it, and along the sidewalk went a man who carried a 
net at the end of a long pole. Sandy was sitting in front 
of Don Furber’s house, and Don and some of the other 
children were playing under a tree in the yard. Before 
Sandy knew what the man with the net was going to 
do, he found the net over his head and the man’s hand 
on his ear. He let out a frightened yelp that made the 
children look up, and then they all started on the run. 

‘‘ What are you doing with Sandy ? ” they cried. 

‘H’ve got to take him away,” the man said. ‘‘He 
has n’t any collar on. Nobody has paid his license.” 

“How much is it.^” asked Lewis, with round, fright- 
ened eyes. 

“Two dollars,” answered the man. “ It ought to have 
been paid on the first of May, if you wanted to keep 
him. Is he your dog.^” 

“He is our dog,” they all cried together. And then 
Susie Harris spoke up. 

“ Can we keep him if we pay ” 

The man laughed. “Why, yes, I think so. Have you 
got the money 

“No,” said Susie, “but I know how we can get it. 
Will you wait till next week.^” 

The man stopped to think a moment. Then he said, 



It was hot, hot weather, and as people went by, the cold lem- 
onade looked tempting. They, too, heard the story of Sandy. 


74 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


“Yes, Ull wait a week, if you will promise to keep him 
tied up.” 

Of course they promised, and the man drove away 
on the black wagon, and Susie told of her plan — to 
make lemonade and sell it from a little stand on the 
edge of the sidewalk. 

An hour later there was a little table in the front 
yard of the Furber home, and on it a clean cloth and 
clean glasses and a big pail of lemonade. And Don was 
behind it, crying, as people passed on their way home 
from the railway-station, “ Ice-cold lemonade here, fresh 
made, five cents a glass!” 

It was hot, hot weather, and as the people went by, 
mopping their faces and carrying their hats in their 
hands, the cold lemonade looked tempting. In a little 
while, too, they heard the story of Sandy. 

The next day and the next it was the same; and 
before the end of the week the little pasteboard box 
beside the lemonade-pail had in it not only two dollars, 
but nearly four. And then, in a happy procession, with 
Sandy tugging at his rope, they marched to the town 
hall and paid the license fee. After that they went to a 
hardware store and paid some more money to a man 
who said, yes, he would have it done that day. And 
now, if you should see Sandy, you would find that 
instead of a rope round his neck there is a fine collar, 
with a shining brass plate on it that says, “Lemonade 
Sandy, Kay Street,” 


Caught in a Flood 

T he sun was shining, the dew was sparkling like 
diamonds on the grass, birds were singing, and 
the air was full of the sweet smell of flowers; yet 
to Walter Barnes and Luther Markham it was a sad 
morning. At four o’clock the two boys had seen their 
older brothers climb to the seat of a long buckboard, 
piled high with clothing, fishing-rods, a tent, and boxes 
of good things to eat. Then they had seen the wagon 
start on its twenty-mile trip to the camp in the big 
woods. It was because Walter and Luther were not to 
go themselves that they could not see the beauty of the 
shining dew or enjoy the songs of the birds. 

‘‘Well,” said Walter, after the last sound of the buck- 
board had died away, “we can do one thing, anyway — 
take my old boat, the Marsh-hawk, and explore Birch 
Island.” 

“Good!” cried Luther. And soon the two boys, with 
boxes packed full of cold meat and bread-and-butter 
and jelly and marble-cake, were pushing slowly up the 
stream in the broad, safe old Marsh-hawk, which Mr. 
Barnes had bought for the boys’ own use. 

It is nearly two miles to Birch Island, but the boys 
reached it before the middle of the forenoon, and pulled 
the boat up on the sand-bar at the southern end. The 
island is long, narrow, and low. Over most of it is a thick 


76 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


growth of white birches, with a fringe of alders and other 
bushes along the edge. 

Slowly the boys worked their way ahead, looking for 
new plants and flowers, and counting all the birds’ 
nests, for it was just the place that birds would like 
to build in. They were half-way up the eastern shore 
when Luther heard a strange sound. It was as if all the 
little bushes along the shore were whispering together, 
and all the pebbles singing. 

‘‘Hark!” he said. “What is that noise It sounds 
like the wind, but it can’t be, because the trees are not 
moving. Listen!” 

“Why, it’s the water!” cried Walter. “It’s rising. 
Oh, I know! I heard father say they were going to open 
the gates of the dam up at the Gap, to start some logs.” 

Without being at all frightened, the two boys watched 
the creeping waters come up over the strip of sand, then 
up the stems of the lower line of bushes. But suddenly 
there was a louder and a different sound, and looking out, 
they saw a low wall of water rushing down upon them. 
In another moment it had touched their feet. Then 
it came over their ankles, and crept, cold as ice, half- 
way up to their knees. 

“The trees, Walter, the trees!” cried Luther. And 
both of the now frightened boys made a rush for a 
birch tree big enough for them to climb and to hold their 
weight. 

It was a strange sight that they saw from their perch 
on a strong limb. Birds were flying wildly about, crying 



An old Indian in a red shirty and with moccasins on his feet, 
held the canoe steady while the hoys dropped carefully into it; 
and then, like an arrow, the little craft dashed away. 


78 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


with fear for their young. Under the very tree where 
they sat, a gray rabbit floated by, splashing the water as 
he tried to swim; and a little later they saw two squir- 
rels, swimming easily, and a weasel, with cruel little 
eyes that shone like two black beads. 

The boys shouted for help as loud as they could; and 
after a time the help came, in a way that seemed to them 
as wonderful as the flood itself. 

Suddenly a deep voice, almost under and a little 
behind them, called out, ‘‘Papoose no need be scare! 
Old Sebattis save!” 

They turned their heads, to see a canoe close beside 
their tree, and in it a tall old Indian, in a red shirt, and 
with moccasins on his feet. He held the canoe steady 
while the boys dropped carefully into it, and then, like 
an arrow, the little craft dashed away for home. How 
the boys found in the canoe a drinking-cup and a berry- 
dish of birch-bark, and how old Sebattis taught them 
the way to make such dishes for themselves, would take 
too long to tell here; but it made a happy day for the 
boys. They were even glad that they had not gone 
with their older brothers, because then they would not 
have found old Sebattis. 


Jimmie’s Birds 

E arly on one fine, bright morning, just as Jimmie 
Bailey was starting for school, he heard a sweet, 
clear whistle from the tall elm tree in front of 
his house. At first he thought it was one of the other 
boys who had climbed up there and hidden, to fool 
him; but the tree was so big that no one could climb 
it without a ladder. Then the whistle came again, and 
there was a flash of something bright, like flame, and he 
saw that it was a beautiful bird that had made the call. 

That afternoon he went out under the tree again. In 
a little while the bird came, carrying a long string in its 
bill. Its mate was with it this time, and Jimmie saw 
that they had begun to build a nest away out on the tip 
end of a swaying twig. The bird that made the sweet 
whistling call was of a beautiful bright orange color, 
with wings of jet-black, but its mate was dressed in a 
suit of yellowish brown, that Jimmie thought was not 
nearly so pretty. 

It was a wonderful nest that they were building — a 
perfect little basket, or bag, of string and horsehair and 
lint and bits of bright-colored yarn; and it was so hung 
to the end of the twig that every breeze swayed and 
rocked it back and forth. At the same time, it was so 
far out from the trunk of the tree that no man or boy, 
even if he climbed the tree, could reach it, nor could 
even a cat get at the young birds. 


8o 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


The work of building the nest went on for three or 
four days, and then all at once it stopped. The mother 
bird — in her yellowish-brown suit — was about the 
tree, and seemed frightened. She flew about and back 
and forth, but did not work at the nest; and the father 
bird, in his coat of orange and black, was nowhere to be 
seen. 

On Saturday afternoon Jimmie was looking out of the 
window, when he saw three or four other boys under a 
big maple tree farther down the street. All of them had 
sling-shots, and seemed to be shooting little stones at 
something up in the tree. 

After watching them a while, Jimmie got his own 
sling-shot and went out. 

‘‘What are you shooting at.^” he said. 

“There’s a bird up there, and we ’re trying to kill it. 
It’s got caught and can’t get away, and it will starve to 
death. Johnnie Reynolds saw it there three days ago.” 

Jimmie looked where the other boys pointed, and 
there, hanging head down from a limb, was his beautiful 
black-and-orange bird. It seemed to be tied by one leg. 
Its wings were stretched out, as if it were too tired to 
hold them up, and as it spun slowly round in the soft 
breeze, it fluttered feebly once or twice. 

“Hold on, boys! Don’t shoot again! Don’t kill him! 
He is building a nest in the big elm in front of my house. 
I have been watching him for almost a week. Let’s get 
the big ladder from my yard, and one of us go up and 
set him free.” 



Jimmie kept bravely on till he could just reach out and untwist 
the string that held the bird's leg. 



82 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


The boys decided to. do it. The four of them together 
could just carry the ladder out to the tree, but it was 
too heavy for them to raise. They did not know what to 
do then; but a man came along, and they told him about 
it, and he put up the ladder and held it while Jimmie 
went up. 

It was a long, hard climb, even after he had gone clear 
to the top of the ladder; but Jimmie kept bravely on 
till he could just reach out and untwist the string that 
held the bird’s leg. The poor thing was too weak even 
to cry out, but just lay still in Jimmie’s hand until he 
climbed back to the ladder, and so down to the ground. 

The string was twisted round and round the bird’s leg, 
so that it took some time to unwind it and get it off. 
The bird must have been carrying it to its nest, when 
one end caught in the maple tree and the other end 
wound round its leg. Then the harder it struggled and 
the more it spun round, the firmer it was held. 

When the bird was at last free, it lay still a moment 
on Jimmie’s hand, and then fluttered away, up into the 
elm. That evening Jimmie saw both the mother and the 
father bird together, and the next morning they were at 
work again at the nest, and by midsummer a happy 
little family of four young Baltimore orioles was swing- 
ing in the cozy little basket. Jimmie calls them his 
birds, and everybody who knows about it thinks that 
he has a good right to do so. 


An Indian Birthday Spoon 

I N a clump of tall white birches, a little way back 
from the beach, a tent had sprung up, like a toad- 
stool, overnight. It was Roy Allen’s birthday, and 
he had gone out for a walk up toward the birches, trying 
to think what he could do to make the day happy. 

The tent was stained and streaked, as if it had been 
used many years. In front of it a camp-fire was burn- 
ing, and over the fire hung an iron kettle. In a log by 
the fire a small axe was sticking. It was plain that some- 
one was living in the tent. 

Roy’s heart beat fast. Could it be that an Indian had 
come there to camp ? * The question was answered at 
once, for the flaps of the tent were pushed aside, and 
out came a tall old Indian, his hands full of long, thin 
strips of wood, like ribbons. 

The Indian’s wrinkled, sun-tanned face broke into 
a smile when he saw the boy. He nodded, and cried, 
“How?” 

“Good-morning!” said Roy; and then he could not 
help adding, although he knew it was not quite polite, 
“Are you a real Indian?” 

The old man laughed. “Real Injun; old Sa-ka-we- 
jis,” he said. “Make um basket, make um broom, 
make um bow and arrow. You stay, you see.” 

Here was a chance, and Roy was quick to take it. 


84 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 

The old man went a little way out in front of the tent 
and threw down his bundle of wooden strips at the 
roots of a large tree. Then he went to the brook, and 
out of a pool took some pieces of ash as large as a broom- 
stick and about as long. He also picked up a smooth, 
round stone the size of his fist, and brought that and 
the ash-wood back to the big tree. There he sat down, 
with Roy in front of him watching everything he did. 

The Indian first took one of the pieces of ash and 
pounded it gently with the stone, all the way from one 
end to the other and back again. When he had done 
that, he took a long knife from his belt, and starting 
the blade at the end of the stick, between two layers 
of the grain, he pushed it slowly in. The wood split 
off in a smooth strip, unbroken from end to end. 

When the whole stick had been split up in that way, 
the old man took eight or ten other pieces, round on 
one side and fiat on the other, and laying them across 
one another, so that they looked like the spokes of a 
wheel, he tied them together in the middle with some 
long white roots almost as fine as thread. 

Roy now guessed that this was to be the frame, or 
ribs, of a basket; and when the Indian took some of the 
thin, wet strips he had just split off and began to weave 
them round and round, over and under the ribs, Roy 
knew that he had guessed right. 

The old man worked very quickly, without saying 
much, but every little while he would look up and smile. 
By and by, when the basket was more than half done. 


AN INDIAN BIRTHDAY SPOON 85 


he got up, and said, ‘‘Dinner-time now. You stay, eat 
dinner with Sa-ka-we-jis.” 

Without waiting for Roy to answer, he went into the 
tent, and came out with some potatoes, green corn, and 
onions, and a basket. Having peeled the potatoes and 
the onions, and shelled the corn, he put all of them into 
the kettle, boiling over the fire. Then he took the little 
axe, and with a few blows cut a young birch, trimmed it 
into a stick the length of a cane, sharpened one end of 
it, and with that and the basket, started for the beach. 
In a few minutes he was back again, with the basket full 
of fat, juicy clams, which he shelled and put into the 
kettle. 

From time to time he stirred it, and as the cover was 
lifted and the steam poured out, Roy caught a smell that 
made him feel as hungry as a little bear. 

When all was ready, the old man brought from the 
tent two small tin pans, and dipping one full for him- 
self, he filled the other and passed it to Roy. Then he 
took a large spoon from his pocket and began to eat. 

After a mouthful or two he looked up, and saw that 
Roy was not eating. At that he threw back his head 
and laughed. “White boy no spoon, no can eat soup. 
What can do.^” 

“I don’t know, sir,” answered Roy; and he began to 
think he was going to lose his dinner, after all. 

“Wait. Sa-ka-we-jis show how. Make um Injun 
spoon,” said the old man. 

He got up, went into the tent, and came out with a 


86 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


large wire nail. Taking a clam-shell in his hand, he held 
the sharp point of the nail against the shell, near the 
edge, and struck the nail two sharp blows with a stone. 
There were two holes in the shell ! With his knife he cut 
a limb from a young birch, left it as long as his hand, 
and split one end of it. Into the split end he pushed the 
edge of the clam-shell, and with some of the fine roots 
he laced it in tight, through he two holes that he had 
punched. In ten minutes he had a spoon that would 
hold more than his own. As he passed it to Roy he said, 
‘‘Now make clam eat um clam. Injun dinner, Injun 
spoon.” 

Never did any other dinner taste so good; and when 
Roy was allowed to take home the clam-shell spoon, 
he felt that he had a birthday present worth keeping. 
That was the beginning of a friendship which lasted all 


summer. 


Uncle David’s Brother 

W HEN Alice came downstairs, she found her great- 
uncle David sitting in the parlor alone, and 
very grave and still. He had on his blue uni- 
form with the shining buttons; and his sword, and the 
broad-brimmed hat with its black and gold cord, lay on 
the table beside him. Alice went over to the big chair 
where he sat, for her morning kiss. The old man put his 
hand upon her shoulder and looked down at her so long 
and so strangely that she felt a little afraid. 

‘‘My dear,” he said at length, “I want to tell you a 
little story this morning. I know you will remember it, 
and every year when this day comes you will think of 
the man I am going to tell you about. One day, a long, 
long time ago, the news came that the President had 
called for men to go and fight for the flag. The first man 
in the town to say he would go was my brother Henry. 
Then I said I would go, too. 

“It was very grand when we marched away in our 
new uniforms, with our shining guns. The bands played, 
and everybody cheered us, and we felt very proud and 
brave. 

“ But one night, after we had been away a long time 
and had fought in many battles, our regiment was 
waked up at midnight and marched forward to be ready 
for a great battle that was coming in the morning. 


88 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


‘‘ By daylight the cannon had begun to boom, and in 
a little while the bullets were buzzing through the woods 
like great bumblebees, and big shells screamed through 
the trees, and the men were falling all around us. Clouds 
of smoke hid everything, so we could see only a little 
way. 

‘‘ The enemy fought very bravely; but after a time we 
began to drive them back a little, and at length we 
were ordered to make a charge. We started on the 
run, everybody cheering, Henry and I side by side. 
Just before we reached the ridge where the enemy were 
waiting for us, I felt a sharp sting in my side, and every- 
thing grew black, and I fell. 

“ When I came to, it was dark. I was lying in a little 
wood, and could see the stars shining down through the 
trees. I got up and tried to walk, but I could n’t stand. 
I thought if I could get to the edge of the wood some- 
one might find me, so I crawled along slowly. By and 
by I saw a man sitting with his back against a tree, and 
it was Henry. Just think, dear, how glad I was to see 
him! He was wounded, too, but I did not know then 
how badly. 

‘‘We had been talking a few minutes when we heard a 
groan from a clump of bushes behind us. Henry crawled 
over and found a man in a gray uniform, badly hurt, 
and calling piteously for water. Neither of us had a 
drop. Henry crawled back and sat with me by the tree 
a little while; but he could not rest for thinking of the 
man in the bushes, who was dying for a drink of water. 


UNCLE DAVID’S BROTHER 


89 


‘‘Over to the right we could hear a little running 
brook, and Henry started to crawl to it. He could move 
only very slowly, he was so weak from his wounds; but 
he never stopped or complained. He just dragged him- 
self along till he reached the brook. 

“The bank was high and steep, and he did not have 
strength to climb down; but he lay on the edge and 
lowered his canteen by a cord, and when it was full he 
drew it up. Then he crawled back to the man in gray 
and gave him the water. The poor fellow was so glad 
that he cried, and he made my brother tell him his name 
and where he lived. 

“Henry crawled back to the tree and lay down beside 
me. We began to talk of our home, and by and by he 
asked me to sing, and I did; and Henry sang a little, 
too; and then the wounded man in gray, back in the 
bushes, took up the song in his poor, weak voice. But 
before long we heard him moaning for water again, and 
Henry dragged himself to the brook and got him some 
more, till he grew quiet. 

“ I must have fallen asleep then. When I waked, some 
men who had come to search for the wounded were bend- 
ing over me. I looked all around, but I could not see 
Henry. Then the men looked, and found him near the 
brook. 

“He was cold and still, my dear; but in his hand was 
the canteen, which he was trying to fill again for his 
wounded enemy. 

“The wounded soldier in gray got well after a long 



In his hand was the canteen which he was trying to fill again for 
his wounded enemy. 


UNCLE DAVID’S BROTHER 


91 


time, and once, when the war was over, he came here to 
talk with us about the man in blue who had brought 
him the water. 

‘‘ Every year I keep this day in memory of my brother 
Henry — your grandfather, my dear. He was not a 
general or a colonel or a captain — just a plain private 
soldier. It may be that no one ever heard of him except 
the people in the town where he lived and the men in his 
company; but I am sure you will always be glad to put 
flowers on the grave of a grandfather who died so cheer- 
fully, and who gave his last strength to help a man who 
had fought against him.” 


A Prisoner Set Free 

O F all the windows that Nathan Fletcher had to 
pass on his way to and from school, there was 
no other at which he stopped so often or stayed 
so long as that of Potts & Hunter’s animal store. 
The building stood at the corner of two streets, and 
had a window on each street, and there was always 
something alive to look at. Sometimes it was a pen full 
of hens and chickens; sometimes a flock of ducks pad- 
dling and splashing in a big cement basin. Once there 
had been two young bears that spent most of their 
time wrestling and boxing with each other, as if they 
were two small boys. . Always, in one window or the 
other, there was a cage of kittens, and most of the time 
two or three pens of puppies. 

It was the puppies that Nathan liked best, and one 
little dog, above all, he had seen there so long that he 
felt as if he knew him. Indeed, he even made up a name 
for him, — ‘‘ Bounce,” — because he was always jumping 
or dancing, or pawing the window or the side of the pen. 

Nathan was sorry for Bounce. The other puppies did 
not seem to mind being shut up, but for Bounce the pen 
was a prison. In the street were carts to be chased, and 
other dogs to bark at, and cats to scare, and small boys 
to play with, and Bounce knew it, and wanted to get 
out; and Nathan knew it, and wanted to help him. It 


A PRISONER SET FREE 


93 

seemed too bad that a little dog that had never done 
anything bad should be shut up so long in prison. 

But how could Nathan set him free.^ The only way he 
could think of was to buy him; and when he had gone 
into the store one morning and asked how much they 
would take for the little black-and-white dog in the 
window, with the stubby tail, and stiff hair like whiskers 
on his face, and a yellow spot over one eye, and that 
held his head on one side and kept one ear higher than 
the other, and his name was Bounce, the man laughed, 
and said he guessed he would have to get about five dol- 
lars for such a dog as that; and Nathan went out feel- 
ing pretty bad, for he had not five dollars, no, nor half 
so much. And so it seemed that Bounce might have to 
stay in prison all the rest of his life. 

But then came the morning when Nathan’s father 
sent him down-town very early, — long before school, 
and even before breakfast, — for someone had to carry 
wotd to the plumber before his men left the shop. 

The way to the plumber’s led by the window of the 
animal store, and Nathan stopped a moment to see 
whether Bounce was still there. Yes, he was; and some- 
thing else was there, too. The other puppies were 
crowded together in one corner of the pen, as if they 
were frightened; but Bounce was racing back and forth, 
leaping against the bars, and barking at the top of his 
high little voice. In the big room outside the pen was 
a large monkey, loose. The door of his cage in the corner 
stood wide open. Already the monkey had opened a bag 


94 


UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


of corn and a bag of meal, and had thrown handfuls of 
both into the cage where the kittens were kept, and into 
the glass tank that held the goldfish. As Nathan looked, 
the monkey began to pull the tail feathers from a big 
black rooster; and when he grew tired of that, he took 
a watering-pot and began to sprinkle the kittens, the 
squirrels, and the parrots. 

Without staying to see anything more, Nathan start- 
ed on the dead run for the drug store on the next corner. 
Through the open door he rushed, straight to the tele- 
phone booth. In the big book he found first the number 
of Potts & Hunter, and then that of Mr. Potts’s house. 
He dropped his nickel into the slot, and when the 
answer came, told the man at the other end of the line 
what he had seen. The man thanked him, and said he 
would go right down to the store. Then Nathan .went 
on to the plumber’s, and left the note his father had 
given him. 

On the way back he saw a motor-car stop in front of 
the animal store, and a man dash up the steps and go 
in. Nathan, too, stopped and went in. The man was 
just closing the door of the big monkey’s cage, behind 
the bars of which the monkey crouched, scolding and 
chattering. The whole store looked as if it had been 
turned upside down and inside out. 

The man looked round when he heard Nathan’s 
step. ‘‘Bad work,” he said. 

“Yes, sir,” answered Nathan. “But I’m glad I was 
going by and saw him when I did.” 


A PRISONER SET FREE 


95 


‘‘Oh, are you the boy that called me up?” 

“Yes, sir,” said Nathan. “ I called you.” 

“Well, you did me a good turn, and I thank you. 
Are n’t you the boy who came in here a few days ago 
and asked me how much we would take for the little 
dog in the window? I thought so. Well, now, see here: 
that dog is yours. He’s a real, full-blooded mongrel, 
and knows a lot. You take him home with you as a pres- 
ent from me.” 

It seemed too good to be true, but it was true; for 
when Nathan went out, a black and white and yellow 
ball went with him. It dashed after wagons and got in 
the way of motor-cars, and leaped almost to Nathan’s 
face, and slipped between his legs, and seemed to be 
everywhere at once, and nowhere when it was. wanted. 
And the ball was Bounce, free of his prison, out forever 
from behind the bars, out in the sunlight and the air, 
with a boy who loved him and wanted a playmate, 
and who was sure there was no other playmate that was 
quite so much fun as a full-blooded mongrel puppy. 


Pine-Needle Pictures 

T WO families that are neighbors in town during the 
greater part of the year had been camping out 
all summer in a big pine grove, and the children 
had enjoyed every minute of it. 

Each family had three big tents, and besides, there 
was a great outdoor oven built of stones, with a canvas 
shelter over it, where the cooking was done, and where, 
in the evenings, you could sit round a big, blazing 
camp-fire that cast wonderful shadows out into the dark 
woods. And all of them thought that the rude tents in 
which they slept were much cosier than rooms at home. 

Between four big trees was stretched another piece of 
canvas for a roof, and underneath it stood a table large 
enough for all of the two families. Here they ate their 
meals, with the fresh air blowing through the tree-tops 
above their heads and squirrels chattering in the lowest 
branches. 

The top of the big table was covered with a great 
smooth white oilcloth; and one rainy day, when there 
was nothing else to do, Henry and his Cousin Ethel got 
some half-burned sticks of soft wood from the fireplace 
and began to draw pictures on the table-cover. They 
were having a fine time when Uncle Hubert appeared. 

‘‘0-ho!” he cried. ‘^That will never do! You must 
not make such a muss of that tablecloth! You get 



Ethel began with a house; Henry was busy with a sailboat; and 
Uncle Hubert made a camel and its driver resting under a tree. 


98 


PINE-NEEDLE PICTURES 


some soap and water and wash it all off, and then I’ll 
show you how to make a new kind of pictures.” 

By the time the children had the tablecloth cleaned, 
Uncle Hubert was back again with a basketful of the 
‘‘needles,” or leaves, of the pine trees, which he had 
picked up from the ground. Each of the needles is like 
a slender line, but some are long and straight, and some 
are short and crooked, so that by picking out the kind 
you want, and laying them carefully on the table-cover, 
you can make any kind of a picture. 

Ethel began with a house. It had a door and windows, 
and a chimney, with smoke coming. out; and while she 
was doing that, Henry was busy making a sailboat, with 
all the sails set and the waves dancing. The waves were 
easy to make, for most of the pine-needles are curved 
just right. 

But in the basket Uncle Hubert found a little pine 
twig that had a whole bunch of needles growing on it. 
When he laid that down on the table-cover it looked 
just like a palm tree; so he took some more needles, and 
in a little while had made a camel and a camel-driver 
resting under the tree. 

That pleased Henry and Ethel so much that they 
teased their Uncle Hubert to make some more pictures. 

It was good fun for all the children whenever it 
rained; and when they went back to town in the fall 
they brought a large bag of pine-needles, so they could 
play at the same game during the winter evenings. 
They have grown so skillful now that they sometimes 


PINE-NEEDLE PICTURES 


99 


offer prizes for the one who can make the best picture 
with the fewest needles, and without breaking any of 
them. If you can find short ones in the bunch, it is all 
right; but the children say ‘‘it is no fair” to break them, 
although they had to do it when they made locomotives. 


The Abandoned Well 

T he Lewis children — Tom, Henry and little Bob — 
were spending Old Home Week on their grand- 
father’s farm. There were woods, and wild pas- 
tures full of berries; there were two brooks, pigs and 
hens, the old horse that Bob loved to feed, swallows’ 
nests in the barn with young birds in them, and many 
other things to fill the days with happiness. 

But one day the boys did not know what to do with 
themselves. The men had finished haying, which had 
been a time of great excitement. Tom and Henry had 
done their share: Tom had driven the horse-rake after 
slow and gentle old Charlie, and Henry had used a 
hand-rake to clean up after him; and both of them 
had ridden on top of the great, swaying, jouncing 
load, and in the barn they had leaped from the big cross- 
beams over a dizzy distance to the soft, sweet-smelling 
beds of hay in the mows. Now that it was all over, they 
were trying to think what they should do next. 

And then, when they were berrying in the north pas- 
ture, they found the old well. It had been dug years 
ago, to furnish water for the cattle; and although it was 
only ten feet deep, there had always been water in it. 
But when grandfather dug the big ditch to drain the 
land, the water had all leaked out. 

Over the well stood a long, old-fashioned well-sweep. 


THE ABANDONED WELL 


lOI 


made of a young tree with a fork at the upper end driven 
into the ground, to hold the great thirty-foot pole that 
carried the bucket hanging from one end, and held, in 
a sort of pocket made of wooden pins, a great stone 
that served as a weight. 

In the grass and bushes beside the old well the boys 
found the bucket still hanging to its iron chain, and 
they found that by pulling down hard on the chain, 
they could send the bucket to the bottom. When they 
let go, the weight of the stone on the pole would bring 
it up again. 

‘‘Oh, I know what we’ll do!” cried Tom. “We’ll 
play that we are miners. I’ll be the engineer that stays 
on top of the ground and runs the hoisting-engine, and 
you can be the miner, and I will let you down and draw 
up the buckets of coal that you dig.” 

At first Henry did not want to go down, but at last 
he said he would if Tom would promise to pull him up 
as soon as he wanted him to; and Tom promised. 

With Tom holding the bucket steady, Henry climbed 
in and held tight to the chain, while Tom swung him 
carefully over the edge and began to let him down. But 
Tom had not thought about Henry being heavier than 
a bucket of water, and although he held on as hard as 
he could, the chain slipped through his fingers and hurt 
his hands, and for the last three feet the bucket went 
pretty fast, and struck the bottom with a bang that 
frightened both boys. 

It happened that Henry was not hurt. Still, the fright 


102 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


made him wish to come up at once, and Tom tried to 
raise him by pulling on the chain. He found that he 
could not lift him an inch, no matter how hard he tugged. 
Henry’s weight was greater than that of the stone on the 
pole. 

Both boys were now badly frightened, especially 
Henry, who began to cry. But Tom told him not to be 
afraid; he would get him out in a few minutes. And 
then he had a happy thought. The day before, when the 
tin-pedler had called at the farmhouse, the boys had 
watched him as he weighed a big bundle of rags on a 
steelyard; and Tom had noticed that, although the 
weight would not lift the rags at first, when it was 
near the centre, it did lift them as soon as the pedler 
moved it out near the end. He saw at once that the pole 
of the well-sweep was like the arm of the steelyard. 

‘‘I know! I know!” he shouted; and in an instant 
he had begun to climb the post that held the long pole. 
Slowly he worked his way up until he reached the fork, 
and then, wrapping his legs round the pole, he slid along 
toward the big stone. 

In a little while he felt the pole move just a bit, and 
then it began to rise, and went on rising till the stone 
rested on the ground, and there, on the other end, was 
the bucket, hanging on the edge of the well, with Henry 
safe in it. 

How carefully he held the pole down till he saw 
Henry work his way over the side of the bucket and 
stand once more on the good green grass ! Then he slid 


THE ABANDONED WELL 


103 


down, and the two boys hugged each other, and then 
went home. 

There is an abandoned coal-mine on grandfather’s 
farm that will probably never be worked, but grand- 
father does not know it. 


In, Lost Swamp 

I N the summer Leonard Mitchell began to spend 
much time in the woods. His home was in a small 
village, back of which lay big, wild land that 
stretched away to the mountains. 

There were several little streams in which. trout could 
be caught, and one or two ponds where there were perch 
and pickerel and bass. Altogether, the country about. 
Denridge, the village in which Leonard lived, was a 
fine place for a boy who loved the woods. 

Leonard’s father would not allow him to have a gun, 
because he thought he was not yet old enough; but he 
made for him what he called an arrow-rifie. It was of the 
same shape and size as a real rifle, only, instead of using 
cartridges, it had a strong rubber cord as thick as 
Leonard’s little finger, and shot small arrows about a 
foot long. It shot so well that Leonard could knock an 
apple from a tree or a cent from the end of a split stick 
set up the width of the street away. 

With his trusty arrow-rifle over his shoulder and a 
pail of luncheon in his hand, Leonard would start off 
early in the morning, right after breakfast, and stay 
until supper-time. Tramping the woods until he was 
tired, and finding new places to explore, he would sit 
down at noon under some shady tree by a spring of 
water and eat his luncheon. Then, after a long rest, he 


IN LOST SWAMP 


105 

would spend a part of the afternoon in picking berries, 
so that he usually went home with a full pail. 

One day, while he was eating his luncheon, he was 
startled by a sudden rush behind him. He turned 
quickly, to find a large dog by his side, and behind the 
dog a man with a gun on his shoulder. 

The man smiled pleasantly, and said, ‘‘Are you look- 
ing for berries.^” 

“Yes, sir,” answered Leonard. 

“Well,” said the man, “I have just tramped over 
through the woods from Lemmington, and just a little 
way back — not more than half a mile — I found a little 
swampy place full of high-bush blueberries. No one 
has ever gathered them. The bushes are so high that 
they are almost like trees. You can climb up into them; 
and the berries are as big as hazelnuts. There are 
bushels of them.” 

Here was exciting news! Blueberries were worth ten 
cents a quart. A bushel would come to more than three 
dollars ! 

Leonard began at once to hunt for the little swamp; 
but although he searched till nearly dark, he found no 
trace of it. That evening he went over to the house of 
his best friend, Ben Edgerly, and told him about it. 
Ben eagerly agreed to go partners and help hunt for the 
lost swamp. 

Early the next morning they started, each with a big 
pail and a large package of luncheon. By going first to 
the spot where the strange man had come upon Leonard 


io6 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


the day before, and making that their starting-point, 
they were able to keep the direction better; and a little 
before ten o’clock they found the swamp. 

What a sight it was! Never had either of the boys 
seen such bushes or such berries. All that the man had 
said was true. 

Going off a little to one side, where the ground was 
higher and drier, they laid their luncheon and their 
coats under a tree, and then returning to the swamp, 
began to pick. The berries were so big that it was not 
work but play, and they piled up so fast that by noon 
each boy had his ten-quart pail nearly two-thirds full. 
But they were hungry then, and decided to leave the 
berries where they were. 

What a surprise they had 1 Under the tree where they 
had left their luncheons were only scraps of torn and 
greasy paper. Not a bit of food could be found. 

‘‘Who do you suppose did it, Len.^” asked Ben. 

“ Maybe it was that Joe Wilkins,” said Leonard. “He 
saw us going off this morning. Perhaps he followed us.” 

It was hard to have no luncheon, but since it could 
not be helped, the boys decided to go back and finish 
filling their pails, and then go home. But they were to 
have another surprise. They found both pails tipped 
over and all the berries gone. It looked like a pretty 
mean trick; but neither Leonard nor Ben was a boy who 
would give up easily when he had once started to do a 
thing, so both of them picked up their pails and went 
doggedly to work to fill them again. 


IN LOST SWAMP 


107 


Picking as fast as they could, and moving on wherever 
the berries seemed to be thickest, the boys in a little 
while had worked some little way apart from each other, 
but without knowing it. Then Leonard, just as he 
reached a fine bush loaded with great rich, dark blue- 
berries, heard a rustle and a sudden ‘‘Woof!” on the 
other side of it, and found himself looking right into the 
face of a half-grown bear! 

For a moment he was too frightened to move, but 
he was not too frightened to yell. He gave one wild cry, 
“A bear, Ben, a bear!” at the top of his voice. At the 
sound the bear disappeared, and Leonard heard the wild 
rush he made as he dashed away through the bushes. 
Then Leonard, too, ran at the top of his speed, as he had 
never run before. 

A minute later Ben joined him, and he also was run- 
ning as if the bear were at his very heels; and neither 
boy stopped till the first houses of the village came in 
sight. 

The next day a party of hunters, guided by Leonard 
and Ben, visited the little swamp. There, sure enough, 
they found plenty of traces of bears — tracks in the 
mud, .as of an old bear and two young ones, and bushes 
bent down and stripped of their berries. It was plain 
enough where the boys’ luncheons had gone and how 
their pails had been tipped over. But the bears them- 
selves could not be found. 

The next year Leonard was so much bigger that his 
father allowed him to have a real gun; and armed with 


io8 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


that, the two boys visited the swamp again, and for 
many years afterward, and gathered many bushels of 
berries, without ever being disturbed again by bears, or 
seeing any sign of them. 


The Captives 

M ice had been seen in the pantry, and that eve- 
ning Harry and Ruth watched with much eager- 
ness to see the trap baited and set. 

It was not one of those little traps that shut down 
quickly and choke the mouse, but a big wire cage, which 
must seem to a mouse like a large, airy room. Father 
cut off a piece of cheese that was hard and would not 
break easily, and after toasting it a few minutes over 
the fire, fixed it firmly on the little wire hook that hung 
down from the roof of the cage. Then the big door at 
one end was fastened so that it would stay wide open. 
Any mouse that smelled that lovely toasted cheese 
could walk right in and help himself; but just as soon 
as he stood up on his hind legs and began to nibble at 
the cheese, bang! would go the door behind him, and 
he would find himself shut in tight. 

The next morning Harry was the first one up. He 
waked Ruth, and together they crept quietly down- 
stairs and to the pantry before Mary, the maid, was out 
of bed. 

As they pushed open the pantry door, they saw some- 
thing that made them both cry out in wonder. The door 
of the wire cage was closed, and inside was, not one 
mouse, but seven. 

There was one big mouse, and cuddled close up to 


no UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


her were six small mice children that had followed their 
mother into the cage. She had not even nibbled the 
cheese until they were all safely inside. 

Strangest of all, the little family was curled up in a 
beautiful nest, made of bits of paper and small pieces 
of string and hairs and a few small rags, all nicely 
woven together into a little round bed, as soft and warm 
as anyone could wish. 

Where could that nest have come from.^ When the 
trap was set the night before there had not been any- 
thing in it but the piece of cheese, that was now half- 
eaten. Not even the little baby mice could get out. 
Who could have brought in the things the nest was 
made of.^ The children could not tell. After breakfast 
Mr. Arnold said he was going to try to find out. 

He first took the cage back to the pantry and set it 
down on the floor, just where it had been all night. 
He left the pantry door open a little way, and placing 
a chair outside, in the kitchen, he sat down where he 
could see the cage all the time; and he told Harry that 
if he would promise not to move once, or even to whis- 
per, he could stay with him. 

For a long time they saw nothing except the mother 
mouse and her babies in the trap. Then all at once a 
small gray shadow crept out from a corner and ran to 
the cage. It was another mouse; and in his mouth he 
carried a little rag. 

When he reached the cage there was a great squeal- 
ing. He stood up on his hind legs and pushed the rag 


THE CAPTIVES 


III 


through the bars, and the mouse inside ran over to 
him and took the rag and ran back to her nest and pat- 
ted the rag into place in the wall. 

Three times he came. The second time he brought a 
little bit of cotton, and afterward a small piece of string 
and all those things the mother mouse took when he 
pushed them into the cage, and used them to make the 
nest warmer. 

‘‘Now, children,” Mr. Arnold said, “what shall we do 
with this family of mice.^ We can’t have them running 
round in the pantry, eating and spoiling our food.” 

“Oh, father, I know what I should like to do with 
them,” said Harry. “I should like to take them away 
off somewhere, in the woods, and let them go.” 

And that was what they did. The cage was taken to 
a sunny place at the far end of the garden. There the 
door was opened and the children went away. When 
they came back, the cage was empty. Mrs. Mouse had 
moved her little family to the country. 


On the Old Wharf 

F or a boy who lives most of the year away from 
the sea, the little town of Bayhead is a fine place 
to spend the summer. There is always something 
to do there. When it is pleasant, you can dig clams or 
go crabbing, or fish off the end of the old wharf. When 
it rains, you can go up into Captain Billy’s sail-loft and 
watch him sew with a funny big thimble held in the 
palm of his hand; or you can sit in Captain Benny’s 
shop and see him build boats while he tells stories. 

To Walter Manly the rainy days were almost as 
happy as the pleasant ones, for he liked both Captain 
Billy and Captain Benny, and was always glad to be 
with them. The two old men were brothers. Both had 
been sailors all their lives, and for many years had 
hunted whales in the south seas. Captain Billy had 
only one leg, and had to use a crutch when he walked. 

Walter had wondered a good many times how Cap- 
tain Billy had lost his leg, but of course he did not like 
to ask him. But knowing that he and Captain Benny 
were brothers, he felt that he might ask Captain Benny. 
So one rainy day, when he and Thornton Hadley were 
in the boat-shop, he put the question. 

“How did Captain Billy lose his leg.^” the captain 
repeated after Walter. “Why, the bight of a rope took 
it off.” 


ON THE OLD WHARF 


113 

‘‘The bite of a rope!” cried Walter. “How could a 
rope bite a man’s leg off? I guess you are making fun of 
me, captain.” 

“No, no, my boy. It was the bight of a rope, but not 
the kind you are thinking of.” 

“ But what is it ? ” asked the boys. 

“A bight is a loop, and it is a thing a sailor is always 
afraid of, and a whaler, especially.” 

And then the captain took a rope and showed them 
what he meant. He told them about hunting whales: 
how the small boats leave the ship, and the men row 
quietly up to the whale until they are near enough for 
the man in the bow to throw the harpoon into the 
whale. He showed them a harpoon, which is a short 
iron spear with a long, fine rope fastened to it; and he 
told them how careful the men must be to see that the 
rope is coiled just right in the tub at the bow of the 
boat, because when the whale feels the harpoon, he 
usually dives and goes down so fast that the rope some- 
times makes the edge of the tub smoke. If the rope is 
not coiled just right, it may catch when it runs out, and 
the whole boat be dragged under the water. And if a 
man happens to get his foot or his leg caught in a loop 
of the rope, he may be pulled overboard, or his leg cut 
off. 

That was what had happened to Captain Billy. A 
careless sailor had let the rope get kinked, and a loop 
had caught round Captain Billy’s leg and pulled him 


over. 


1 14 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


He was carried down, down, down, and might never 
have come up if Captain Benny, who was in the same 
boat, had not grabbed a hatchet and cut the rope. Cap- 
tain Billy rose to the top of the water at last, and the 
men got him into the boat; but his leg was so badly cut 
that it had to be taken off. 

Both Walter and Thornton thought they would re- 
member the captain’s story; but a week later, when they 
were fishing from the end of the old wharf, something 
happened that made them forget. 

They were fishing for flounders with Ned Pierce, 
who lives all the year in Bayhead. The captain had 
helped them bait their hooks, and was watching them, 
when Walter suddenly had a great tug on his line — so 
hard that he nearly lost his hold on it. When he pulled, 
the head of a big fish came to the top of the water. 
‘‘Oh, what is it.^ What is it.^” cried the boys. 

“It’s a dogfish!” shouted the captain. “Hold hard, 
now! There must be a school of them.” 

Walter had been lying flat on the wharf, but in his 
eagerness to land his big fish, he stood up and stepped 
nearer the edge, and gave a hard pull. The pull must 
have sunk the hook deeper in the fish’s mouth, for he, 
too, gave a great pull to get. away. Walter stepped 
ahead one step more, without seeing where he put his 
foot. The next moment he felt himself falling. Some- 
thing had pulled his right leg out from under him, and 
in another instant he went with a great splash into the 
water. 


ON THE OLD WHARF 


IIS 


The next he knew his head was just above the water, 
while something sharp and cold was gripping him 
through his clothes, between the shoulders. It was 
the captain’s boat-hook, and by the long pole which 
made the handle of it the captain was holding him up. 
Ned and Thornton ran down the steps and pushed out 
in a boat, and in a few minutes had him on board, a 
good deal frightened. 

“There, my boy,” said Captain Benny, when Walter 
was safe on land again, “you see now what I meant 
when I told you to look out for the bight of a line. You 
stepped in the bight of your fish-line, and your fish 
pulled you off your feet. If it had been a whale, we 
should not have got you so easily. Next time you must 
be more careful with your line.” 


Uncle Dan^s Bear Story 

TELL,” said Uncle Dan, when the children 
y V teased for a story, since you all want some- 
thing different, I think I shall have to decide 
myself. How would you like to have me tell you about 
a bear that has frightened more people than any other 
in the world, and that frightened me lots and lots 
of times 

“O-o-o-o! Goody!” cried all of them together. 

“ It’s about a grizzly bear,” said Lyman. 

“No, a polar bear,” guessed Lizzie. 

“I think it’s a cinnamon bear,” declared Bob. 

Uncle Dan laughed. “No,” he said, “it is n’t any 
one of those bears. It’s a kind of bear you never heard 
of — a bear that has very strange habits, and is dif- 
ferent from any other bear in the world. 

“In the first place, this bear is found all over the 
country, not only in wild places in the woods and moun- 
tains, but even more often near log houses and little 
villages, and especially about old pastures where you go 
to drive the cows in the morning and to get them again 
at night. 

“The strangest thing about this kind of bear is that 
you never see him in the daytime or in the morning, but 
only when it has begun to get dark a little at evening, 
and on nights when there is just a tiny bit of moon. 


UNCLE DAN’S BEAR STORY 


117 

‘‘When I was a boy, I had to take my father’s cows 
to pasture every morning and go after them every night. 
I never met one of these bears in the morning, but some- 
times I would see three or four in a single evening, and 
they would frighten me so that I would run all the way 
home.” 

“Did they chase you. Uncle Dan, or did you shoot 
them, or scare them away.^” 

“No, dear, I don’t think any of them ever chased 
me, though I ran too hard to see; and I am sure I never 
shot one, partly because I had no gun with me then, and 
partly because this kind of a bear is so hard and tough 
that a bullet does n’t hurt him at all; nor can you scare 
him away. He will not run from anybody, no matter 
how much you shout or how loud a noise your gun 
makes. He just stays right there.” 

“How big are they, and what color asked Lyman, 
whose eyes were round with interest and excitement. 

“They are of all sizes,” said Uncle Dan; “sometimes 
not any larger than a Newfoundland dog, sometimes as 
tall as a big man; but they are always dark-colored, 
almost black, and they are always standing very still. 
The place where you are most likely to see them is in 
the shadows near trees, and in fence-corners, and along 
the edges of old pastures.” 

“Well, but. Uncle Dan,” began Rob, eagerly, “if 
you can’t shoot them and can’t drive them away, what 
can you do with that kind of bears Do you always 
have to run away from them? I think that is cowardly.” 


ii8 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


“No, my boy,” answered Uncle Dan, with a smile, 
“there is another way. If you are brave enough to go 
right up to one of these bears and touch him with your 
hand, he will never hurt you, but will disappear at 
once — so quickly that you can’t see him go. That is 
the only thing to do, but I did n’t find it out for a long 
time — until I was almost grown up.” 

“But what is this strange bear.^” asked Lizzie, with a 
puzzled look on her face. “What is the name of it.^” 

“Why, they call it the stump bear,” answered Uncle 
Dan; “and, as I said, he has frightened more persons, 
especially small boys and girls, than any other kind of 
animal.” And Uncle Dan laughed. 

For a second the children did not know what to think. 
Then Lizzie burst into a joyous laugh. “ I know what it 
is!” she cried. “It isn’t a bear at all! It’s just an 
old stump that you think is a bear, like that one near the 
spring, up at grandpa’s!” 

“Yes,” admitted Uncle Dan, “that is what I meant. 
I knew you had seen them, too!” 


A Pioneer’s Thanksgiving 

W HEN Thanksgiving comes round, the Lowden 
family always come together in the old home- 
stead, where Grandfather and Grandmother 
Lowden still live. It is a large family, with many sons 
and daughters, and grandsons and granddaughters, too; 
and it is widely scattered. Some of the members live in 
cities, some in the country; but wherever they are, when 
the great day comes, they go back to the old farm. 
And when they have eaten the big dinner, all except 
the nuts and raisins, some one of the children is sure to 
say, ‘‘Now, grandfather, the story!’’ And grandfather 
laughs, and says, “Pooh! You have all heard that story 
till you know it by heart.” But they say no. They have 
forgotten just how it happened, or they do not remem- 
ber what it was that the Indian did ; and so at last grand- 
father says, “Well, if you must have it, here it is”; 
and then he tells this story. 

“ I was a boy then, twelve years old, and my sister 
Ellen was only fourteen. Father had come into the wil- 
derness and started to clear this farm when I was three 
years old. He had built a log house and a log stable, 
and had cleared enough land to raise good crops of 
wheat, corn, potatoes, and other vegetables. Neighbors 
had taken up land below us, and there was one family 
^bove, but the nearest house was a mile away. The 


120 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


log cabin that we lived in stood right where this house 
stands. Father put it here because of the fine spring of 
water. 

“We had had a good summer that year, and the little 
hole under the house that we called a cellar was full of 
vegetables and the stable packed with grain. From the 
beams of the kitchen hung hams and bacon from our 
own hogs, and long strips of pumpkin were drying. By 
Thanksgiving time everything was ready for the winter, 
even to the great banking of dry leaves round the house, 
to keep it warm. 

“The day before Thanksgiving mother had been 
making soap in the great iron kettle hung over a fire 
outdoors. In the middle of the night we were all awak- 
ened by the barking of old Ben, our dog; and when I sat 
up in bed, I saw that the room was as light as day. For 
a moment I could n’t tell what the matter was, but it 
did n’t take long to see that the house was on fire. One 
end was already burning fiercely, and the blaze was 
leaping higher every minute. It had started outside. 
Probably the embers of the soap-making fire had come 
to life in the night wind, and blown into the banking 
of leaves. 

“Father had just time to snatch blankets from the 
beds and wrap them round my mother and my sister 
and me, and hurry us out into the cold night. It was 
useless to try to save the house. The only water was 
that in the spring, and there were only two or three 
pails to carry it in. We did what we could, but the fire 


A PIONEER’S THANKSGIVING 


I2I 


soon drove us back, and in a little while the house was 
only a pile of glowing coals. 

‘‘We had been so busy watching and fighting the 
fire that we had given no thought to the stable, which 
was behind us; but by and by I heard a crackling, and 
looked, and saw the roof all ablaze. Father and I got 
out the two horses and the cow, but the building we 
could not save. And so, on Thanksgiving morning, we 
stood, wrapped in blankets, with neither a roof over our 
heads nor any food. My mother and my sister were cry- 
ing, but my father spoke only once, and said, ‘The Lord 
will provide.’ 

“It was just getting light enough in the morning to 
see, when out of the woods behind the spot where the 
house had stood, a figure came. I could not see who it 
was, except that it was a man, and that he had some- 
thing on his back. He walked straight up to where we 
stood, and threw down in front of us the load he was 
carrying. 

“Then we saw that it was old Sebattis, an Indian 
whom father had found lying with a broken leg beside 
the trail a year or two before. He had brought him home 
and set the leg, and kept him till he was able to travel 
again. The load that he had thrown down was a hind 
quarter of venison and six partridges and about a peck 
of parched corn in a little sack. While we all stared at 
him, the old man straightened up, and said, ‘How! 
Sebattis see fire and know, so he come. By and by come 
again.’ Then he turned and went back into the woods. 


122 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


“That was the finest Thanksgiving that I ever re- 
member, and the best dinner. We cut slices from the 
venison and broiled them over a fire built against the 
big rock out here in the yard. The partridges father 
rolled in soft clay, till the clay covered them all over, 
and then baked them in the ashes. When he raked them 
out and cracked open the balls of clay, each one 
contained a bird that was cooked as tender and juicy 
as any that your grandmother can cook in the oven of 
the range. The parched corn we ate for dessert. 

“All those things I remember, but best of all I re- 
member what father said when we sat down to eat. He 
told us what the day meant, and how thankful we 
should be. And then he made a prayer of thanksgiving 
that was the most beautiful that I ever heard: 

“The Lord did provide, as father said He would. 
Neighbors came from far and near, — some of them 
fifteen miles, — and before the snow flew they had 
helped us put up another log cabin, and had filled it 
with provisions; and the next year father built this 
house.” 


Pedro’s Wooden Leg 

A lthough it was a bright, sunny afternoon, and 
vacation-time, Johnnie Coleman looked very 
unhappy as he leaned against the orchard wall. 
He wanted to be out with the other boys, who were 
playing ball on the corner, but his mother had asked 
him to wait and take his sister Ruth out in the baby- 
carriage. 

There were some smooth, round stones beside the 
wall, and to show how badly he felt, Johnnie began to 
throw them at a basket Hiram had left hanging on the 
Baldwin tree. Just then Pedro, Johnnie’s pet rooster, 
flew up on the wall. Pedro was very white, and against 
the dark shade of the apple trees he made a flne mark. 

“Guess I ’ll see if I can make him jump,” said Johnnie 
to himself. With that, he let fly the stone he had in his 
hand, and the next thing he knew, Pedro fell over with a 
great flapping of wings, and squawked so loud that Mrs. 
Coleman came out to see what was the matter. 

With terror in his heart Johnnie ran along by the wall. 
As he drew near, he saw that Pedro could not stand up. 
One of his legs hung limp and helpless, and there was 
an ugly hole where a little blood had already begun to 
show. 

Johnnie gathered the chicken up in his arms and ran 
to the house. “Wfll he die.^” he asked anxiously of his 


124 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 

mother. ‘‘See, his leg is all wobbly, and he can’t stand 
up!” 

“I cannot tell, my dear, whether he will die or not,” 
said his mother. “He is badly hurt. I did not think my 
son could be so cruel.” 

“But I did n’t mean to hit him, mother! Honest, I 
did n’t!” protested Johnnie. “Could n’t a doctor cure 
him.?” 

“Perhaps so. You had better ask Dr. Williams.” 

The doctor looked very grave when Johnnie appeared 
with Pedro in his arms. He wiggled the broken leg back 
and forth, and said, “Large, contused wound and frac- 
ture of the tibia. Pretty serious case. Did you wish me 
to operate.?” 

“Oh, yes, sir, please, if you can!” said Johnnie. 

The doctor went into another room and very soon 
returned with a new shingle. From it he split some long 
pieces which he shaved thin and smooth with his knife. 
While Johnnie held Pedro, the doctor washed the broken 
leg and set the ends of the broken bone together. He 
placed a bandage over the place where the stone had 
hit, and put the strips of shingle, which he called splints, 
all about the broken leg. Then he wrapped the whole 
with strong tape to keep the splints in place. 

When he set Pedro down on the floor, Johnnie was 
delighted to see that the rooster could stand as well as 
ever. 

During the next two weeks Johnnie and all his friends 
spent much time watching “ the rooster with the wooden 



During the next two weeks Johnnie and all his friends spent much 
time watching the rooster with the wooden leg. 


126 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


leg.” Pedro stumped about the yard as if nothing had 
happened. He limped a little at first, and sometimes fell 
over if he started suddenly to run; but when Johnnie 
called him, he came stumping along as fast as he could, 
just as he used to before he was hurt; and Johnnie was 
glad of that, because, he said, it made him feel that 
Pedro had forgiven him. 

When the time came, Johnnie took off the bandages 
and splints, as the doctor had told him to do. The leg 
was all well, and only a small scar remained. Johnnie 
felt so happy then that he thought for a moment of 
throwing a large stone at Mrs. Dana’s cat, which was 
asleep under the cherry tree in the next yard. 

But a few days later the postman brought Johnnie a 
letter. It contained a slip of paper, which read like this: 

Master John Coleman, 

To Dr. Charles F. Williams, Dr. 

To Professional Services . . . $3.00 

‘‘What does it mean, mother.^” asked Johnnie. 

“Why, it means that you owe Doctor Williams three 
dollars,” she said, “and this is the polite way of asking 
you to pay him.” 

“ But how can I pay him when I have n’t any money } ” 
said Johnnie. 

“But, my dear boy, you asked him to set Pedro’s leg 
for you, and of course a gentleman would not ask an- 
other person to work for him unless he intended to pay 
him. You must ask papa about it.” 


PEDRO’S WOODEN LEG 


127 


Johnnie’s father told him the same thing, nor did he 
offer to give Johnnie the three dollars. But after a little 
while he said that he had been thinking of hiring a boy 
to rake up the dead leaves and to help Hiram gather the 
early apples. He should be willing to pay a boy twenty- 
five cents a day for such work. 

‘‘Can’t I do it.^ Will you pay me twenty-five cents a 
day if I do it.^” asked Johnnie, eagerly. 

And his father said yes. 

It took two long weeks to earn the three dollars, and 
every day Johnnie could hear the boys laughing and 
shouting down at the corner. 

But when finally the last twenty-five cent pieces had 
been earned and paid over to the doctor, instead of going 
at once to play with the boys, as he had meant to, 
Johnnie sat down on the doorstep and thought a long 
time. 


“Old Mustard” 


W HEN Grandmother Lane was a little girl, her 
father came in one day and said, ‘^Wife, it is 
all settled at last. I have sold the farm. Next 
week we will start West. There is a large company go- 
ing from here, and we must try to get ready to go with 
them.” 

Little Mary, as grandmother was then called, heard 
the news with great delight, because she knew it would 
mean a long, long journey, lasting months, and carrying 
them into a new country, whefe there was never any 
cold weather, and where great crops could be raised 
without much hard work, and there would always be 
plenty to eat. Besides, her family was not going alone, 
but many other families whom they knew were going at 
the same time, so that she would have some of her play- 
mates with her all the way. 

It was a wonderful sight when the great day came at 
last, and the long wagon-train set out. In all there were 
more than forty wagons, some drawn by four or six 
horses, and some by as many as eight big oxen. And 
such strange wagons! They were more like little houses 
on wheels, only instead cff a roof there was a high frame 
overhead made of hoops, and covered with canvas, so 
that it made a sort of tent to ride in by day, if you 
wished, and to sleep in at night. And from the hoops 


‘‘OLD MUSTARD’’ 


129 


hung all sorts of things — hams and pieces of bacon, 
strips of dried pumpkin, pans to cook in, and clothes. 
Underneath the big wagon, outside, swung the great 
kettles, in which the larger things were cooked, and 
axes, and ropes and chains for pulling the wagons out 
when they got stuck in the mud. 

To little Mary it was all new and delightful. The big 
wagons squeaked and groaned and swayed from side to 
side till the hams hanging from the frame overhead 
would swing back and forth like the pendulum of a 
clock. There were the shouts of the men to the horses 
and oxen, the barking of the dogs that ran along the side 
of the trail, the sharp cracking of the drivers’ whips, 
and the ting-tang of the iron kettles swinging against one 
another. And always they were passing through places 
that were new and seeing things that were fresh and 
strange. 

The wagon of Mr. Harding — that was grandmother’s 
father — was drawn by four oxen, but one of them, 
known as Jerry, began to show signs of sickness when 
they had been on the road a few days. The men gave 
him medicine and doctored him all they could, but he 
seemed to grow weaker all the time instead of better, 
and one morning, when they went to yoke the oxen to 
the wagon, they found him dead. 

For a day or two they went on with only three oxen. 
Then Mr. Harding met a trader who was willing to sell 
him a pet ox that he called “Old Mustard,” to take the 
place of Jerry. 


130 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


It was a very funny-looking ox, indeed, not like any 
that Mary or anybody in her family had ever seen be- 
fore. He had a very large, round head, with shaggy hair 
matted on top, and on his back was a large hump. In 
color he was a dirty yellow all over. That is why the 
trader called him Mustard. 

‘‘He is n’t very pretty,” said the trader, “but he is 
strong and good-natured, and will pull more than any 
ox of his size that I ever saw. Besides, he will get on with 
less grass and less water. He is half-buffalo — he shows 
it in his head and shoulders. For that reason he will be 
worth more to you than any scout or watch-dog; he can 
smell Indians a mile away, and will fight them at sight.” 

Mr. Harding did not quite like to buy so strange an 
animal, but he must get another ox somewhere, and so 
he took Old Mustard. 

By the end of the first day he was very glad he had 
done so, for the funny-looking yellow creature took its 
place at the tongue of the cart and pulled steadily and 
well. And every day after that Old Mustard worked 
faithfully, and seemed never to be sick or to feel tired. 

By the end of the fourth week the wagon-train had 
entered a country where the Indians were known to be 
on the war-path, and trouble was expected. They even 
found the remains of three partly burned wagons. 

Great care was now taken to send scouts ahead during 
the day and to prepare the camp for defense at night. 

The first thing that was done as soon as the stop was 
made for the night was to “park” all the wagons, as 


‘‘OLD MUSTARD” 


131 


they called it. The big ox-carts were placed in a great 
circle and chained one to another. Sometimes the cattle 
were picketed outside, to graze, with men armed with 
guns to watch them, and sometimes they were driven 
inside. But always the camp-fires were built in the cir- 
cle, and round them the different families gathered to 
cook and eat their supper. 

One night, when the wagons had been parked and 
everyone had eaten supper and gone to sleep. Old Mus- 
tard began to act very strangely. At first he tossed his 
head and blew hard through his nostrils; then he began 
to move about uneasily as far as his rope would let him, 
and to snort and paw the ground. When one of the 
guards went near him, he turned upon him a pair of eyes 
that were bright green and shiny. 

At last Mr. Harding happened to think what the 
trader had told him. 

“Do you suppose it can be that he scents Indians?” 
he asked one of the other men. 

“It may be,” he said. “It is sure that he is excited 
over something. Perhaps we had better be on the safe 
side and wake the men.” 

Quietly Mr. Harding went from wagon to wagon, 
rousing the sleepers. He had hardly finished when Old 
Mustard, with a terrible roar, snapped the rope that 
held him, dashed to the edge of the circle, leaped a cart- 
tongue, and thundered away into the darkness. Almost 
instantly there came a scream and then the rushing 
charge of Indian riders. 


132 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


They were met by the men of the party, now all pre- 
pared for them and protected by the circle of wagons. 
And finding that their attack had been discovered too 
soon, the Indians drew off after the first rush. 

By the earliest flush of daylight a searching party 
went out from camp. It came upon Old Mustard graz- 
ing about, and not far away lay an Indian trampled into 
the dust. The Indian was the foremost of the band that 
was quietly creeping up on the camp when Old Mustard 
had scented them, and had not only given warning, but 
surprised and killed the leader. 


A Good Lesson 

A S Bessie sat playing with her doll on the shady 
piazza, there came a thump ! thump ! thump ! on 
the walk that led up to the front door. Looking 
toward the gate, she saw a little old lady walking with a 
cane. 

The old lady climbed the steps to the screen door, but 
before she could open it, she had to set down a little 
basket that she carried in one hand. Then she held the 
door open with her cane, and picked up the basket and 
passed in. 

Bessie went on playing with her doll, and in a moment 
her mother, too, came up the steps, for she had been in 
the garden. 

The old lady was a great friend of Bessie’s grand- 
mother. She had brought a basket of cherries, and she 
and Bessie and Bessie’s mother all had tea together on 
the piazza. When the friend rose to go, Bessie sat look- 
ing at her, and made no move to open the door for her, 
but let her mother do it. 

When she had gone, Bessie’s mother said, rather sadly, 
‘‘I am sorry my little girl is so rude. I thought she had 
better manners.” 

‘^Why, mother, I did n’t do anything impolite, did I? 
I did n’t do anything at all.” 

“No, my dear. That is the trouble. You did n’t do 



And then the little girl made a curtsey and said, “ I only wish 

sir, that it was to let you in," 


A GOOD LESSON 


I3S 


anything when you should have done much. More than 
a hundred years ago there was a little girl in the South 
about your age. She had the same kind of a chance to 
be polite that you had just now, and she did such a 
pretty thing, and did it so well, that she has been remem- 
bered for it ever since, and people in the South still tell 
about it, although even the little girl’s name has been 
forgotten.” 

‘‘Oh, tell me about her!” cried Bessie. 

“Well, it is a very short story. She was the daughter 
of a lady who was a great friend of General George 
Washington, and one day she was in the room with her 
mother when the general called. She sat there till he 
rose to go; then she got up and held the door open for 
him to pass out. As he reached the door, he bowed to 
her, and said, ‘My dear, I am sorry to make you so 
much trouble.’ 

“And then the little girl made a curtsey, — a stiff 
little bow that every child of that time learned to make, 
— and said, ‘I only wish, sir, that it was to let you in.’ 

“ It was a lovely speech for any child to make, but the 
feeling that made her say it was lovelier still.” 


How Grant Earned His Calf 

G rant NORCROSS had come with his father 
and mother to spend a month in Tilton on his 
grandfather’s farm. 

Strange sounds met his ears on the first morning. 
The roosters waked him. From the edge of the woods a 
crow was calling, and somewhere near the barn a cow 
was bellowing at the top of her voice. Close under the 
window was still another noise that Grant could not 
quite make out until he got up. Then he saw that on 
the other side of the orchard wall there was a calf tied to 
an iron stake driven into the ground. Every time the 
cow called, the calf tried to answer. What the cow said 
was hard to understand, but what the calf said was, 
“Ma-a, when will breakfast be ready 

Grant hurried down to the yard to see his grandfather 
feed the stock. His two cousins, boys about his own age, 
were already up and busy at the milking. 

“Why does the cow keep making such a noise 
asked Grant. 

“Because I’ve just taken her calf away from her,” 
his grandfather answered. “We have got to teach the 
calf to drink.” 

“Can’t I do it.?” 

His two cousins, George and Frank, laughed, and 
even his grandfather smiled. “ I ’m afraid you would n’t 


HOW GRANT EARNED HIS CALF 137 

find it a very easy job, or a very pleasant one, at first,” 
he answered. ‘Ht takes a great deal of patience and not 
a little grit.” 

‘‘But I can be patient, and I know I’ve got grit. Do 
let me try, grandfather.” 

The old man turned a kindly eye on Grant’s eager 
face. There was something about it that he liked - — a 
good, clean chin and a well-shaped mouth. “Well,” he 
said, at length, “I’ll tell you what I will do. If you can 
teach the calf to drink without beating her or losing 
control of your temper, I will give her to you for your 
own, to keep or to sell, or do anything else with that you 
please.” 

Grant rushed joyfully into the house and asked his 
grandmother to tell him what to do. The next morning 
he got a milk-pail, put about two quarts of milk into it, 
and started for the barn-yard. 

“You had better put on an old apron!” his grand- 
mother called; but that seemed too girlish, and Grant 
kept on as if he had not heard. 

The calf braced her feet stubbornly when he tried to 
get her into the orchard. He set the pail down, and 
called, “So, Boss! Here, Boss!” as he had heard his 
cousins do. But the calf did not move. 

Grant crept nearer. His grandmother had told him 
not to be afraid; that a calf was a gentle little creature 
that would not bite, and could not hook, since she had 
no horns. When he was within reach, he put the pail 
under the calf’s nose, dipped his finger in the milk, and 


138 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


placed it in the calf s mouth. He was half-afraid that 
she would bite, after all. 

But the calf did not bite. For a moment she did noth- 
ing but hold Grant’s finger. She stood with all four feet 
spread wide apart, and her tail stood out straight like a 
ramrod. Then the tail kinked up, the fore legs moved 
back, and with a glad leap, the calf thrust half of her 
head into the pail. 

The head came out white to the eyes with milk. 
Then, looking Grant square in the face, the calf blew 
a mighty ‘‘Whoosh!” that completely spattered him 
from head to foot. 

Grant set the pail down to wipe the milk out of his 
eyes, and hearing a low laugh, turned, and saw that the 
whole family were watching him. 

He dipped his finger again into the milk, and held it 
toward the calf’s mouth. This time it was the calf’s hind 
legs that moved. They went up into the air, and her 
head went down, but only far enough to hit Grant fair 
in the pit of the stomach and knock him flat on his back, 
with the milk-pail on top. 

When Grant went back to the house, his grandfather, 
still laughing, said, “Well, my boy, going to give it up.^” 

“No, sir,” said Grant. “I came after some more 
milk.” 

It was not that day or the next, or even the first or the 
second week, that Grant earned his calf. It took a long 
time and cost much hard work. One day the calf stepped 
in the pail, and sent all the milk splashing over Grant’s 


HOW GRANT EARNED HIS CALF 139 


feet and legs. Sometimes she would slap him across the 
face with her tail, sometimes try to swallow his whole 
hand, and at other times run round him two or three 
times, until the chain bound both of them tight to the 
iron stake. 

Then one day the calf began to drink as soon as he 
put the pail under her nose, and there was no more 
trouble. 

When he told his grandfather, the old gentleman said, 
‘‘Well, Grant, you have earned your calf. But you have 
done something a great deal bigger.” 

“Why, grandpa, what do you mean.^” 

“‘He that ruleth his spirit is better than he that 
taketh a city,’ ” his grandfather answered. 


Johnnie’s Bright Idea 

T O each of the three Lawrence boys Santa Claus 
had brought a sled — to Joe a little one, to 
Frank a middle-sized one, and to Henry a big 
one. He had been good to the two Morrill boys also, for 
he had brought sleds to both Charlie and Edward. But 
he had forgotten to send any snow to go with the sleds. 
For weeks the ground had been bare, and of course you 
cannot do much with a sled on bare ground. 

Every day the boys looked out of the window as soon 
as they got up, but never a patch of white did they see; 
until at last, one Friday morning, when the wind had 
been howling all night, the boys looked out and saw 
nothing but snow. There was a steady “tickle-tackle” 
as the hard flakes struck the window panes and bounded 
off. The roofs were like the sides of snow-covered moun- 
tains; and as for the yard and the road outside, you 
could not see them. But when Saturday morning came 
the sun was shining. 

By nine o’clock every one of the new sleds was out. 
Some time before daylight the men had gone by with 
the snow-plough. The sidewalks were ditches, with high 
white walls on both sides. The road was another ditch, 
with mountains of snow between it and the sidewalks. 
It was just what the boys had been hoping for. 

Tyler Street, where they usually coasted, was too 


JOHNNIE’S BRIGHT IDEA 


141 

short, and that was what made them think of Sargent’s 
hill. 

Sargent’s hill is almost as steep as Tyler Street, and 
nearly three times as long, and most of the time no bet- 
ter coasting place can be found; but just before the cold 
weather set in, the men had come and dug a big ditch 
across the lower end of it, and thrown the dirt up in a 
great wall. Then the ground froze so hard that they 
could not work any longer, and they had left both the 
ditch and the wall; and beyond them no sled could pass. 
The boys did not know. about that until they went over 
there, and even then they did not think much about it. 

And so they started — Charlie Morrill first; and after 
him came his brother Edward, and then the Lawrence 
boys, Johnnie Otis, and all the others. Down they went 
in a long line, faster and faster, until the tears came into 
their eyes, and they could hardly see to steer. 

When Charlie Morrill saw the high wall of snow in 
front of him, he put his feet down hard, and tried to 
stop; but he was going faster than he thought, and be- 
fore he could bring the sled to a standstill, he was on 
top of the wall, and had almost fallen over into the ditch. 
The others had the same trouble, and two of them were 
going so fast that they buried their heads in the snow, 
and had to roll off the sleds to keep from going over. 

The next time it was just as bad, and the next time 
after that; for the more sleds went down, the smoother 
they wore the track, the faster they went, and the 
harder it became to stop. 


142 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 

It was then that Johnnie Otis had his bright idea. 

‘H tell you what we’ll do,” he said. ‘‘We’ll all go 
home and get clothes-lines. Then we can measure the 
hill from the top to the bottom, and tie a sled to a line 
just as long as the hill. Then we can’t help stopping 
before we get to the snowbank.” 

“That’s great!” cried the boys, and five of them 
started for their homes. In a little while they were all 
back again, each with his mother’s clothes-line. Johnnie 
and Fred Hunt tied three of the lines together, and went 
down to the foot of the hill and held one end. The other 
boys pulled the rope tight, and tied the end of it to a 
lamp-post at the top of the hill. Then they began to 
haul it in and to coil it in a circle on the snow at one 
side of the track. When Johnnie and Fred came back, 
they fastened the other end of the rope to the biggest 
sled, and three of the boys got on it and started. 

Faster and faster they went. They knew that the 
rope was shorter than the hill, and would stop the sled 
before it reached the snowbank, and so of course they 
did not put their feet down to stop it. 

The boys at the top were watching. In front of them 
the rope ran out of the coil like an endless snake. The 
sled, slipping down the long hill, grew smaller and 
smaller; then, as they looked, they saw it suddenly stop, 
and above it three figures sailed through the air, like 
frogs diving for deep water. Over the top of the bank 
they disappeared in a cloud of snow, but the sled stopped 
where it was. 



When the other boys reached the foot of the hill, the three who had 
gone down were sitting digging the snow from their ears and 
the hacks of their necks. 


144 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


When the other boys reached the foot of the hill, the 
three who had gone down were sitting on the top of the 
bank, digging the snow from their ears and the backs of 
their necks. 

‘‘What was the matter, Johnnie.^” asked one of the 
boys. 

“Nothing,’’ said Johnnie, sheepishly. “Only I should 
have tied the rope to my leg instead of to the sled.” 


! 


The Little Red Workers 

P AUL HOWE, with his sister Dorothy and their 
father, was standing by the railway crossing, 
waiting for a train to go by. The gates were 
down, and from away up the track they could hear a 
rattle and rumble that told them something was com- 
ing. They wondered whether it would be a long, slow 
freight train or a short, quick passenger train. But 
round the curve came something that the children had 
never seen before — a little car, just big enough to hold 
two men, whose backs were moving up and down, up 
and down, as if they were bowing to each other. As the 
car went by, the children saw that between the two men 
was a bar that first one pushed and then the other; and 
that, as it went down on one side, it went up on the 
other, and that that was what made the car go. 

‘Ht must be great fun!” said Paul. 

But Dorothy thought that instead of being fun, it 
must be hard work. 

‘Ht is both work and fun,” said their father, ‘Tor 
the right kind of work is the best fun in the world.” 
And he told them that the men, going up and down the 
track every day, were all the time watching to see that 
there were no broken rails or loose ties, and that thus 
they helped to guard against train wrecks. 

“It is a good work,” he added, “and hard, but not so 


146 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 

hard as that of the little red men who help to keep the 
time of the world.” 

The children had never heard of those little red men, 
and so, after dinner, their father told them the story. 

“A long time ago,” he said, ‘‘there were wise men 
who were trying to build a factory to make time for all 
the people. After a great deal of thought and work, 
they did it. It was such a little factory that anyone 
could carry it round in his pocket; and when he wanted 
to know what time it was, all he had to do was to look 
in at the factory window. 

“They made wheels and chains and pulleys for the 
factory, that would work day and night, year in and 
year out, and never stop or get tired. But there was 
one place in the factory that they found it hard to fill. 
They wanted two men to move a big wheel back and 
forth, without ever stopping. Of course, it was very hard 
work, but the wise men said, ‘Brass is hard and strong, 
and we will try men of brass.’ 

“The men of brass worked as well as they could, but 
it was too hard for them, and sooner or later they grew 
tired and wore out, and the wise men had to get some- 
one to take their place. 

“ ‘Steel is stronger and harder than brass,’ they said, 
and so they tried men of steel; but they found in time 
that even they could not do the work, but had to stop. 

“And then came the little red men. They had always 
lived all by themselves, deep in the ground in India; 
and because they belonged to a very great and rich 


THE LITTLE RED WORKERS 


147 


family, had never in their lives done any work. But 
now, when they learned what the wise men needed, they 
came forth and offered themselves, and said, ‘Try us. 
We are stronger than brass and harder than steel, and 
we never tire or wear out.’ 

“And so the wise men took them and tried them, and 
set them at work in the factory. 

“It was more than a hundred years ago that they 
began to work there, but they are working still, and 
show no signs of being tired. And during all that time 
they have never stopped or rested; but night and day, 
through all those years, they have pushed the big wheel 
back and forth five times a second. They never sleep, 
and they eat nothing except a little oil; and that they 
get only once in a year and a half or two years. Up and 
down, and up and down, and up and down, the little 
red backs bob; and back and forth, and back and forth, 
the big wheel spins. And the two little red men must 
work always together, and always just so fast, and no 
faster. One of the little red men is named Ruby, and the 
other is named Sapphire. If you listen at the factory- 
door, you can hear them at their work. And because 
they are always working, we can always tell what time 
it is.” 

And then he took his watch from his pocket, and held 
it to the children’s ears; and they heard the busy work- 
ers. And when he opened the case, they looked in, and 
saw the red backs bobbing up and down. 


The Dog that Danced 

I T was Saturday, and so, of course, there was no 
school. All the week the ice on the ponds had been 
growing thicker and thicker, to the great joy of 
the Conway boys, James and Arthur, and their friend 
George Arnold; for their fathers had told them that, 
if the ice was strong enough by Saturday, they might 
skate down across Long Pond and go through the pass 
to Big Island Lake. 

It was found that the ice was thick enough, so about 
ten o’clock they started. Their mothers had put up 
luncheons for them, and the boys were going to build 
a fire on the ice, near the shore, to keep warm while they 
ate, and perhaps cook some bacon by sticking the slices 
in the ends of split sticks, and holding them over the fire. 

The ice was so clear that the boys, by putting their 
faces down close to it, could look through it as they 
could through a pane of glass, and see things on the 
bot;tom, near the shore, and dead leaves moving slowly 
along toward the outlet. Once George saw a fish — a 
big pickerel, as long as his arm. 

By the time they reached the foot of Long Pond it 
was nearly noon, and the boys were so hungry that 
they decided to have their luncheon at once. They 
wanted some dry wood to make the fire, so they all took 
off their skates and laid them down on the ice by the 


THE DOG THAT DANCED 


149 

boxes of luncheon. Then they went back a little way 
into the woods on the shore, for the sticks. 

Each boy gathered a big armful — so big that it 
stuck away up in the air in front of him and almost 
kept him from seeing where he was going. But they 
pushed their way through the bushes to the ice again, 
and dropped the wood in a pile for their fire. 

Just then they heard a crackling in the bushes. They 
turned and saw a big, funny-looking dog coming out. 
He was shaggy, and a kind of dirty brown in color; and 
he had small eyes, very black, that twinkled, and a 
sharp nose that kept quivering and wrinkling up. 

When he saw the boys, he stopped a moment, and 
put his nose up in the air and sniffed. Then he walked 
slowly out on the ice toward the boys’ luncheon. His 
walk was ungainly. 

‘‘What a big dog he is!” said James; and indeed he 
was — bigger than any the boys had ever seen before. 

“And what a funny walk he has!” said George. 

Then the other boys noticed it, too — a kind of roly- 
poly, waddling walk, as if he were made of jelly, all 
shaky. They had never seen a dog walk like that before. 

The dog did not pay any attention to the boys, but 
kept right on toward the lunch-boxes they had left on 
the ice. He did not seem to be cross, and they went a 
few steps toward him, and shouted and shook sticks at 
him, which they took from the pile of wood. Then he 
growled, but kept right on toward the luncheon. 

“Throw your stick at him,” said James to Arthur. 
“ Perhaps that will scare him.” 


150 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


Arthur threw the stick, but as it whirled through the 
air, the big dog suddenly stood up on his hind legs and 
caught the stick in one of his paws, just as a boy will 
catch a baseball bat that another boy tosses to him. 
Then the boys were astonished and terrified to see him 
begin to dance on his hind legs, moving in a circle, bal- 
ancing the stick, swinging his head up and down, and 
making a funny noise that was partly growl and partly 
as if he were trying to sing when he had a bad cold. 

“It’s a bear! It’s a bear!” cried George and Arthur 
together; and getting James by the hand, they all three 
started to run. 

Now every boy knows how hard it is to run on ice 
without skates. You keep slipping and sliding, and you 
cannot turn quickly at all. Before the boys could reach 
the shore, the bear, moving in a circle, had got between 
them and the land, and. in trying to turn, James slipped 
and slid right ahead, toward the bear. He set up a 
great cry, but George and Arthur did not let go of him, 
although they, too, were very much frightened. 

Then, all at once, there came a great shouting and 
crashing in the bushes, and out popped a little man with 
high boots and a red flannel shirt and a fur cap. His 
eyes were big and black, and his hair curly, and in his 
ears he had little rings of gold. He talked very loudly 
to the bear, and seemed to be scolding him, but the 
boys could not understand what he said. He walked 
right up to the bear and slapped him twice across the 
face with his hand. The bear whined, and began to 



All at once, there came a great shouting and crashing in the 
hushes, and out popped a little man who talked very loudly 
to the bear and seemed to he scolding him. 


IS2 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


dance all the faster. Then the little man took a big 
collar from his pocket and strapped it round the bear’s 
neck, and began to lead him away by a rope. Just before 
he went he turned to the boys and said, with a smile 
that showed his white teeth, ‘^Bad Beppo! Run away. 
No like dance. Get cold, get seek.” 


The Star in the Grass 

I N a sunny opening in the woods a little group of chil- 
dren were gathering wild flowers, when one of them 
heard a rustling in the leaves behind him, and, 
turning quickly, saw an old man standing there. 

He was a strange-looking old man, and strangely 
dressed. On his head was a wide-brimmed soft hat of 
black, with a black and gold cord about it that ended in 
two small tassels hanging over the edge in front. His 
clothes were of dark blue, with brass buttons, and in the 
lapel of the coat was a smaller button of copper. In his 
right hand he carried a cane — just a plain stick, on 
which were fresh green spots where little twigs had been 
cut away; but he did not lean upon the stick, or use it 
as a cane, but held it rather as a man would hold a sword. 
He was very tall and straight, and there was a look of 
command in his eyes, which were still clear and sharp 
under his shaggy eyebrows; and that, with the long 
white hair and the snowy beard, trimmed to a point on 
the chin, made him a man that anyone would turn to 
look at. 

The boy beside whom he had stopped rose quickly 
frorh the grass and looked up into his face, a little fright- 
ened; but his fear melted away at once, for the face 
lighted in a grave, sweet smile, and a deep voice said, 
^Ht is good to be gathering wild flowers on such a day.” 


154 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


‘‘Yes, sir,” said the boy; and at the sound of the 
voices other children joined them, so that in a few min- 
utes all of them were gathered round the stranger, who 
had seated himself on a rock, with his back to a tree. 

As the old man looked at them he smiled again and 
said, “Yes, there are few things better than gathering 
flowers on a day like this. I see that you have many 
beautiful ones. Do you know the names of them.^” 

They pulled their nosegays apart and showed him 
what they had — a few late violets, some little bell- 
like yellow lilies, wild geraniums, buttercups, and here 
and there a lady’s-slipper. 

“You have done well,” said the old man, “but there 
is one flower that you have not found, and that flower 
is the loveliest and most wonderful in the whole world.” 

“What is it.^” asked one of the little girls. 

“It has many names, but I call it the Star in the 
Grass.” 

“We never heard of it,” said the children. “Does it 
grow here.^” 

“It grows everywhere in this, our country, from the 
warm south to the far, cold north; but only in certain 
places, and to And it you must know those places.” 

“Are there any here.^” asked one boy. 

The old man shook his head. “Not in these woods, 
but very near. You have only to cross the road and you 
will come upon many, oh, so many, so many!” As he 
repeated the words, he looked away over the heads of 
the children, as if he did not see them. 


THE STAR IN THE GRASS 


I5S 


‘‘Let us go and find them!” cried one of the older 
boys; and some of the other children made as if to fol- 
low him. 

But the old man raised his hand. “No,” he said, 
“not yet. You would not know the flower if you saw it, 
nor where to look for it. I must tell you.” 

He stopped a moment, and the children waited. Then 
he went on, — 

“I have told you that it is the loveliest and most 
wonderful flower in the world. There are many wonder- 
ful flowers. Some blossom only once in a lifetime, so 
that a man may live to be seventy years old and never 
see one of them in bloom. Others open only at certain 
hours of the day. One blossoms only in the night — you 
must go without your sleep to see it; and there are some 
that grow in wild and far-off places, but are so beautiful 
that men gladly risk their lives to get them. 

“But the Star in the Grass is more wonderful and 
more beautiful even than they are, for, although it blos- 
soms but once a year, it always blossoms on the same 
day of the year, so that those who know and do not 
forget can always be sure of finding it in bloom. North 
or south, east or west, wherever in this great country 
you may be on that day, there you will find the Star in 
the Grass, and always you will find it covered with 
blossoms. 

“You will never know how much it cost to make that 
flower grow upon our soil, but it was far more than any 
other flower ever cost; for multitudes of men worked 


156 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


more than four years for it, and spent hundreds of mil- 
lions of dollars, and went cold, and were hungry and 
bore pain and suffered the loss of legs and arms to win 
it. And they did more, even, than that; for when they 
found that even then they could not win it without 
paying a still greater price, hundreds of thousands of 
them paid the price and gave up their lives. 

‘‘There are flowers in the world that have strange 
powers to take away the senses of men: to make them 
mad or drowsy, or to fill them with a desire to do evil; 
but the perfume of the Star in the Grass is not like that, 
although it is even more powerful. Those who breathe 
it are filled with courage and with love for their coun- 
try, and their eyes are opened to the knowledge that 
to die for their country is the greatest glory that can 
come to anyone.” 

“But whose are those flowers now, that cost so much, 
and where do they grow.^ We have never seen them,” 
said one of the children, as if he doubted the old man’s 
words. 

“They are yours and mine. They belong to every one 
of us who thinks enough of them to care for them; and 
they grow where those who paid so much for them have 
willed that they should grow. That is wherever a faith- 
ful soldier sleeps. They mark the resting-place of no 
coward, nor of anyone who did not give what he could.” 

The old man rose and looked smilingly down at the 
children. “I must go now,” he said, “for this is the day 
when the Star in the Grass is heavy with its blossoms, 


THE STAR IN THE GRASS 


IS7 

and I like to look upon them, and to breathe their fra- 
grance. Would you care to come.^” 

The children gathered their bunches of wild flowers 
into their hands, and followed wonderingly and in si- 
lence. When they had come out of the little wood and 
had crossed the road, they passed, through high stone 
gates, into a great and beautiful garden, where a band 
was playing, and crowds of people were moving about, 
and there were other old men in blue clothes and brass 
buttons who hailed their guide as ‘‘Comrade.” And 
by and by the band and the old men began to march; 
but every little while they stopped, and wherever they 
stopped the children saw a little flag, and there indeed, 
heaped all about it, were the blossoms of the Star in the 
Grass. 


The Deer with a Red Tie 

T he little girl had been sick, and the doctor said 
she must go away — to the woods or the sea — 
and stay a long time, perhaps a year. That is 
why her father and mother took her to live on a great 
farm a long way off. 

It was after dark when they reached the farm, and 
Bessie lay asleep in her mother’s arms, for she was 
very tired. All day they had ridden behind two horses, 
through thick woods that came right up to the sides of 
the wagon. 

When the sun peeped in at the window the next morn- 
ing, Bessie looked out on a new world. Instead of other 
houses near by, she saw only wide fields and high moun- 
tains, and all around the great green woods. 

For many days she kept finding new things to enjoy. 
There were the four horses, Billy and Ben and Silas and 
old Jennie; and there were six cows, and one of them. 
Spot, had a beautiful little red calf. Then there was a 
small kitten, and a big yellow dog named Tige. Bessie 
learned to know them all, and to think of them as 
friends; but it was with the kitten and old Tige that she 
played most. She liked to put the kitten on the dog’s 
back, and see him walk off, wagging his tail. It always 
made her laugh to see how funny Tige would look when 
the kitten would dig her claws into his back. He would 


THE DEER WITH A RED TIE 


IS9 

roll up his eyes and turn his head, as if he were saying, 
‘‘Well, what are you sticking pins into me for?” 

But after a time Bessie grew tired of those playmates, 
and began to wish that there was some other little girl 
that she could play with, or that she had some pet of 
her very own. 

And then came the great fire. The air for days had 
been full of smoke, and all the woods looked blue, and 
the sun was a great golden-red ball. Men had come 
from other farms and places far away, with buckets and 
axes and blankets, to fight the fire. But all the time the 
smoke was getting thicker and more choky, and at 
night there were long, moving lines of red on the moun- 
tain, like companies of men marching with torches. 

On the third day, after the men had gone to fight the 
fire, one of them came back with something on his 
shoulder. Bessie ran out to see what it was, and the 
man put into her arms a beautiful little spotted fawn. 
It cried like a lamb, for it had lost its mother, and was 
hungry. 

As the man was going along a road through the woods, 
he had heard a little bleating at one side, and when he 
went to look, he had found the fawn lying under a bush. 
Its mother had been driven away by the fire, and in try- 
ing to follow her, the fawn had burned its feet so badly 
that it could go no farther, and had lain down to die. 
So the man put it on his shoulder and brought it to the 
house, and gave it to Bessie for her own. 

The first thing was to teach it to drink milk. That 


i6o UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


they did by rolling some linen rags into a little ball and 
dipping it into warm milk and then giving it to the 
fawn to suck. He learned quickly, and at the end of a 
week would lap the milk from a dish; and because it was 
Bessie who first fed him, he looked upon her as his mis- 
tress and best friend, and would follow her anywhere. 

They named him Teddie. At first he used to sleep in 
the cow-shed; but as he grew bigger he wanted to be 
outdoors all the time, and so he was shut up no more, 
but wandered away in the woods whenever he pleased. 
But every morning, early, he came to the farmhouse 
door for the milk that he knew Bessie would get for him. 
If the door was shut and she did not hear him, he would 
bunt with his head until someone came; and one morn- 
ing, when the door was open and his milk was warming 
in the oven, he walked right in without knocking, and 
went over to the stove and put his head in at the oven 
door and began to drink his milk. 

Even old Tige became fond of Teddie, although he 
would chase other deer; and often you could see the 
fawn closely cropping the fresh grass, while old Tige sat 
watching him, as much as to say, ‘H’m here, and I will 
not let anyone hurt you.” 

By the time the cold weather came, Teddie had grown 
big and strong, and his feet were so well that he could 
walk as well as any other deer. And to Bessie the roses 
of her cheeks had come back, and she, too, was well and 
strong again, and was to go back to her old home. But 
the last thing she did before she went away was to tie 


THE DEER WITH A RED TIE 


i6i 


a red scarf firmly round Teddie’s neck, so that no hunter 
could mistake him for a wild deer and shoot him. And 
some of the lumbermen who knew Bessie and her love 
for her pet placed sign-boards along the roads near the 
farm, on which they printed this: Don’t shoot the 
deer with a red necktie. He is tame, and his name is 
Teddie.” 


The Battle 

I N its winding hollows among the hills of the back 
pasture the little pond stretches away, shady and 
inviting. It is not a deep pond — nowhere over a 
boy’s head. 

Such a pond is not to be found on every farm, and 
when Fred and his cousin Lewis came out of the woods 
path right at the edge of the water, of course they 
wanted to stop and play. They had been there many 
times before, and each of them had a raft which he had 
built, and on which he used to pole himself about among 
the islands. But this time they knew they ought not to 
stop, for Grandfather Dixon wanted them to come up to 
the back lot as soon as they had eaten their dinner, and 
bring the box of tools that stood on the end of the bench 
in the shop. 

They had started early, and all the way had carried 
the box, which was heavy. Perhaps that is why they 
felt like stopping to rest a while when they reached the 
shore of the pond. 

‘‘Let’s go out just a little way on the rafts,” said 
Lewis. “We’ve got time enough.” 

“All right,” said Fred, “but we mustn’t go far or 
stay long.” 

The boys put down the box of tools and started to- 
ward the two rafts. Just a little way from the shore 


THE BATTLE 163 

they came upon a peck measure, probably left there by 
one of the men when he carried salt to the sheep. 

‘‘Oh, look!” cried Fred, as he picked it up. “What 
a fine seat it will make!” And he carried it with him 
and placed it bottom-up on his raft. 

The two boys took their long poles and pushed out. 
Lewis was a little ahead, and when he happened to look 
back and saw the peck measure on Fred’s raft, he began 
to laugh. “ It looks like the Monitor,” he said. 

Both boys had been reading about the wonderful 
battle between the Monitor and the Merrimac; and 
they remembered that at first someone had called the 
Monitor “a cheese-box on a raft,” because the flat deck 
was so low, and there was hardly anything on it except 
the turret, which was like a large round iron box. 

“I tell you what!” cried Fred. “Let’s play battle! 
You be the Merrimac and I ’ll be the Monitor. I ’ll come 
out from behind the island, and you can meet me, and 
we will see which one can drive the other ashore.” 

Lewis agreed, and for a little while the boys chased 
each other’s rafts up and down the little pond, and 
bunted them as hard as they could by setting their 
poles deep in the mud and pushing with all their 
strength. Then Lewis suddenly cried, “Let us make 
some oars! It’s a great chance, while we have the tools 
here.” 

They went ashore and hunted about till they found 
some small boards. With a hatchet from the tool-box 
and their pocket-knives they soon made four small oars. 


i 64 uncle ZEB and HIS FRIENDS 


or paddles. By that time they had forgotten all about 
their errand. Lewis put the tool-box on his raft for a 
seat, and Fred had the peck measure, and they began 
to row about the pond. Fred thought he saw a chance to 
bunt the Merrimac in the side, and drive her ashore. 
So he bent over his oars and pulled as hard and fast as 
he could, without ever stopping to look over his shoulder. 

All at once there was a dreadful thump — the two 
rafts had come together, bang! and before they knew 
what had happened, both boys had turned a somersault 
and rolled head over heels off the rafts into the water. 

It was only up to their shoulders, and they waded 
through the mud to the shore. 

Then they remembered their errand and how long 
they had stopped, and were frightened when they 
thought what their grandfather would say. Their 
clothes felt awfully cold and sticky before they got the 
heavy box up to the place where the men were working, 
and they felt so ashamed that they could not say any- 
thing when Grandfather Dixon asked them why they 
were so late. But he looked at them and their dripping 
clothes, and said, ‘‘Oh, I seel You have been hurrying 
all the way! You must have been. Why, you are fairly 
dripping with perspiration. Hurry home, now, just as 
fast as you can go, and tell your grandmother I think 
you must be sick, and I want her to put you to bed at 


The Storehouse in the Wood 

T he next time that Johnnie called on Uncle Zeb, 
after they had found the sassafras tree, he came 
upon the old man just as he was getting up from 
the breakfast-table. It was plain that a part of his meal 
had been bread and honey, for there was a little of the 
honeycomb still left on the plate. Uncle Zeb politely 
waved a hand toward the table and the honey, and said, 
‘‘Help yourself.” 

“Do you like it.^” he asked, as he watched the little 
boy eat. 

“Yes,” said Johnnie, “I like honey better than any- 
thing else in the world.” 

“Then perhaps you would like to help me get some.” 
“Where could we get it.^” asked Johnnie. “I thought 
the grocer brought it.” 

“You can get it at the grocer’s if you have money to 
pay for it; but we can get it without money, by knowing 
how, and working for it. Besides, it will be better honey; 
for what the grocer sells is tame honey, and what we 
shall get will be wild honey, with the taste of many 
flowers that do not grow in gardens.” 

With that. Uncle Zeb went to a closet and took out a 
little box, in which he put a piece of the honeycomb; 
and then they started. 

Along the path round the foot of the mountain they 


i66 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS" FRIENDS 


went, until they reached a little knoll that was bare of 
trees. There Uncle Zeb took out the little box and set it 
on a stump. Then he hunted round until he found two 
stones that were rather soft and crumbly. Over the 
cover of the box he rubbed the two stones together, 
until the rubbing made a white powder that fell on the 
box-cover. When there was a little heap of it. Uncle 
Zeb sent Johnnie to the brook to fill his drinking-cup 
with water; and while he was gone the old man chewed 
a little twig of birch until it was flattened out like a 
small paint-brush. 

“Now,” he said, “I think we are all ready.” 

Opening the little box, he laid a piece of the honey- 
comb on the stump, and held a lighted match to it until 
the comb began to smoke and scorch. Then he and 
Johnnie lay down in the edge of the woods a little way 
from the stump — to watch, as Uncle Zeb said. Johnnie 
did not know what they were watching for; but, while he 
was wondering, the old man touched his arm, and said, 
“Look!” And Johnnie saw that a bee had lighted on 
the comb and was helping herself to the honey. 

Uncle Zeb rose quickly, and going quietly over to the 
stump, took the little wooden brush he had made, wet it 
in his mouth, dipped it into the white powder from the 
two stones, and painted the body of the bee, who was 
so eager to get the honey that she made no attempt to 
fly away. Then, beckoning Johnnie to him, the old man 
said, — 

“In a minute or two now she will start for home. 
You must watch sharp to see which way she goes,” 


THE STOREHOUSE IN THE WOOD 167 

Johnnie kept his eyes fixed on the bee. Sure enough, 
in a little while she rose, circled round and round in the 
air, as if to take note of everything about the place, in 
order to be sure of finding the way back; then she struck 
out straight for the big woods on the other side of 
Thompson’s Hollow. 

Johnnie thought that they were to follow at once, 
but the old man said that they must wait until the 
bee came back; and he took out his big silver watch and 
began to count the minutes, — one, two, three, five, 
eight, ten, twelve, — and there was the bee back again 
— the same one, they were sure, for they could plainly 
see the white belt that Uncle Zeb had painted on her 
back. 

‘‘Her store of honey is about a mile away,” said the 
old man. “A bee takes about five minutes to fly a mile, 
and she stays about two minutes in the hive. See the 
big hemlock on the other side of the hollow ^ Keep it in 
your eye. And now we will try again.” 

This time he took the box and the bit of honeycomb 
and went farther along toward the big hemlock. There 
he put the comb on a rock, and scorched it as before, 
and waited. When a bee lighted on it, he painted her 
as he had the first one, and then very carefully both he 
and Johnnie watched to see where she would go. 

When she rose, she started in the same direction that 
the first one had taken. 

“We know the road now,” said the old man. “Let us 
go ahead.” 


i68 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


Four times they set out the little bait of honey- 
comb, and every time the bees came back quicker from 
unloading their find of honey, until at last Uncle Zeb 
said, — 

‘‘We are getting very near. Look at all the big trees, 
to see if you can find a little hole with bees going in or 
coming out. Perhaps the under-side of the hole will show 
a little yellow stain, where some of the honey has rubbed 
off and run down.” 

And so they looked, until their necks ached, and John- 
nie began to think there were no bees anywhere in the 
woods; but just then he heard Uncle Zeb call, and run- 
ning to the spot where he stood, he saw him pointing to 
what looked like a little black knothole high up on an 
old sugar maple, out of which a bee crawled every few 
seconds. 

“We have found it,” said the old man. “From the 
looks, I think there is plenty of honey — perhaps two or 
three pailfuls, maybe a tubful. But we can get it best 
at night. To-morrow, then, at sunset, you will come to 
my house with a pair of overalls tied tight round your 
ankles, and a pair of old loose gloves on your hands, 
and a broad-brimmed hat on your head. Then we shall 
see what the wild bees have gathered for us.” 


Gathering the Treasure 

U NCLE ZEB had told Johnnie to come about sun- 
set, but he was ready half an hour before that 
time. He had done as the old man had told him. 
Over his short trousers he had put a pair of overalls 
which came clear to the ground, and which he had to 
turn up at the bottom to keep them from dragging. On 
his head was a broad-brimmed straw hat with a high 
crown, and in one of his pockets he had a pair of thick 
gloves. 

But the sun had not yet touched the top of Little 
Whiteface, although it was near it, and so Johnnie sat 
down to wait and watch. Lower and lower the golden 
disk sank, until it touched the line of trees, and the 
hungry mountain nibbled a little piece out of the lower 
edge, just as Johnnie had often nibbled the edge of a 
cooky; and even as he watched, the bite grew bigger 
and the cooky smaller, until at last it was all bite, and 
there was no cooky left, as usually happens when bites 
and cookies come together. The sun had set, and it was 
time to go. 

Johnnie found the old man sitting on his doorstep. 
Leaning against the side of the house was a sharp axe, 
and near by stood two shiny milk-pails and an old 
coffee-pot that had a round hole in the cover about as 
large as Johnnie’s little finger. In the hole was a wooden 


170 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


tube, like a pea-shooter, made from a joint of elderberry 
from which Uncle Zeb had punched the pith. 

‘‘Well,” said the old man, with a smile, “our army 
seems to be ready. Let us go forward to the battle.” 

He gave Johnnie one of the milk-pails and the coffee- 
pot to carry, and took the axe and the other milk-pail 
himself; and then, in single file, they started for the bee 
tree — the big sugar maple that they had found the day 
before in the edge of the thick woods on the other side 
of Thompson’s Hollow. 

The old man led, although Johnnie felt sure that he 
could have found the way alone; but since the twilight 
had begun, and the woods were filling with strange 
shadows, he was glad, on the whole, that there was some 
one with him. 

Straight to the old tree they went. Uncle Zeb leaned 
his axe against the trunk, and set his milk-pail down a 
little way off. F rom one of his big pockets he took a large 
piece of mosquito netting, which he threw over Johnnie’s 
head, hat and all, and which he tucked carefully into his 
jacket. After that he tied Johnnie’s overalls down over 
the tops of his boots, and told him to put on the gloves. 
Then, taking off his coat, he began to chop. 

The notch in the tree grew deeper and deeper. When 
it was a little more than halfway through. Uncle Zeb 
stopped, and began on the other side, where he soon had 
another notch that by and by would meet the first one. 

“There!” he said, as he laid the axe aside. “Now we 
are almost ready for your part of the work.” 


GATHERING THE TREASURE 


171 

“What am I to do?” asked Johnnie. 

“You are going to put the bees to sleep, and keep 
them asleep while 1 take out the honey. But first get 
me some dry sticks for a fire.” 

In a few minutes Johnnie had an armful of sticks 
piled neatly together. The old man touched a match to 
it, and it burst into cheerful flame. When it was burn- 
ing well, he took from his pocket a lump of something 
yellow, nearly as large as his fist, and after raking some 
of the blazing coals from the fire into the old coffee-pot, 
he dropped the yellow lump in on top of them and 
quickly shut the lid. 

“Now,” he said to Johnnie, “stand back on this side, 
for the tree is coming down; and when it falls, take the 
coffee-pot and put the spout into the hole where we saw 
the bees go in yesterday, and blow through the wooden 
tube in the cover. That will drive the smoke into the 
tree and put the bees to sleep. But you must be careful 
only to blow through the tube, and not to breathe in 
through it; for the yellow stuff that I put on the coals is 
sulphur, and if you breathe it, it will make you cough.” 

Again came the sharp strokes of the axe, and then 
a warning crack that made Uncle Zeb jump away. 
Against the sky the top of the old tree quivered a mo- 
ment, and then, slowly at first, but rushing ever faster, 
it crashed to earth with a great crackling of limbs and a 
roar that shook the ground and filled the woods with the 
cries of startled birds. 

No sooner had it come to rest than Johnnie had the 



They were going to put the bees asleep and keep them asleep until 

they had taken out the honey. 




GATHERING THE TREASURE 


173 


spout of the coffee-pot at the bee-hole, and was blowing 
through the elder tube in quick, short puffs that shot 
the sulphur smoke far into the tree. The few bees that 
got out buzzed angrily round. Some of them settled on 
Johnnie’s hands and head, and indeed all over his body; 
but they could not sting through his clothing or get 
through the veil of mosquito netting, and so he kept on 
blowing, unharmed. 

Uncle Zeb now came forward with the axe, and with a 
few sharp strokes split out a long slab from the side of 
the tree which laid bare the home of the bees, and all 
the wealth that it held — comb after comb of honey, 
not snowy white, like that from the stores, but some of 
it dark, and some golden yellow, and all of it, as the old 
man had said, rich with the taste of flowers that do not 
grow in gardens. 

While Johnnie held a blazing brand to serve as a 
torch, the old man carefully cut out the combs and put 
them into the pails. There was almost enough to fill 
both of them, and Johnnie’s share was all he could carry. 

‘‘What will the bees do, now that we have robbed 
them ” he asked, on the way home. “Will they starve ” 

“Oh, no. It is still early in the summer, and they have 
plenty of time to make another nest and fill it before 
cold weather comes.” 

“ Still, it seems kind of mean to take it all, does n’t it ? ” 

“Well, maybe so,” answered the old man, “but when 
folks tell everyone else where they keep their riches, 
they must expect to be robbed.” 


The Game of “T.G.B.B.” 


G randfather and Aunt Mary and Cousin 
Sarah and the two small boys, Lewis and John, 
were sitting on the piazza. Grandfather had a 
golf-stick in his hand, Lewis had some tennis-balls, and 
John had a racket. On the piazza floor was a basket-ball, 
which Aunt Mary and Cousin Sarah were idly pushing 
back and forth with quick little shoves of their toes. 

They had all been talking about what they should do 
that afternoon. Grandfather wanted a game of golf, 
but there was no one to play with him. Aunt Mary and 
Cousin Sarah would have enjoyed the lively sport of 
basket-ball, but the friends who had played with them 
at other times had driven to town this afternoon. The 
boys wanted a game of tennis, but although there were 
plenty of tennis-balls, there was only one racket. There 
did not seem to be anything they could all do together. 
But down on the lawn, under a large tree, stood an 
empty peach-basket. 

When grandfather saw it, he got up, put his golf- 
stick in the corner of the hall, and said, ‘‘We will make 
a new game, one that all of us can play. We shall make 
our own rules to suit ourselves, so that the game will be 
our very own.” 

That is how the game of “T.G.B.B.” came to be 
played. Those who know it enjoy it as much as golf, 
tennis, or basket-ball, and play it as often. 


THE GAME OF ‘‘T.G.B.B.” 


I7S 

Grandfather first sent Lewis and Johnnie to the shed 
to get some more empty peach-baskets. They came 
back with five. One they were told to place away down 
by the gate, on the right-hand side of the walk. The 
second they put at the back side of the house, where no 
one could see it from the piazza. A third was set at the 
corner of the wood-shed, another in the field behind the 
barn, and the last one on the piazza itself. 

‘‘There,” said grandfather, “now we have our course 
laid out. The game is to start here, and by batting a 
tennis-ball with the racket, see how few strokes it will 
take to put the ball in all the baskets, one after the 
other, ending with this one here on the piazza.” 

Everybody saw at once what the game was to be, 
and they laughed to think how easy it was. 

“But what are the rules .^” asked Lewis. 

“Well,” said grandfather, “at first we will have as 
few and as simple rules as we can. 

“ Each player will have his own tennis-ball, with some 
mark on it, so that he can tell it at once; but all of us 
can use the same racket. We will all start from the 
same place, at the same time, and go over the course 
together. Each shall have but one stroke, and then 
shall pass the racket to the next player. 

“When all have played one stroke, we will march for- 
ward to the balls, and the first player shall make his 
second stroke, standing on the spot where his ball lies. 
Then the others shall play in turn, in the same way, each 
standing just exactly where his ball lies. 


176 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


‘‘A ball, to count as pocketed, must stay in the basket, 
and not bound out. The one who puts his ball in the 
last basket with the smallest number of strokes shall 
be counted the winner.” 

Those are the rules as grandfather made them up that 
first day. They have never been changed, except that 
when there are tennis-rackets enough to go round, each 
player has one. 

The name, ‘‘T.G.B.B.,” is made up of the first letters 
of tennis, golf, and basket-ball, because the game has in 
it a little of each. 

The family had much fun playing it that summer and 
fall, and have enjoyed it in other years since. Nobody 
is too old to play it, and nobody too young, and any 
number can take part by changing the number of peach- 
baskets, and putting them in different places. 


Why the Squirrels Moved 

O LD MR. SQUIRREL and his family had lived 
many years at The Oaks. He had gone there 
when he was young, because there were so 
many good things to eat, and he had never been far 
away from it since then. Four children still lived with 
their father and mother — Hazel and her three brothers. 
Bob, Rags, and Skinny. 

Happy were the hours they spent together, chasing 
one another up and down the trunks of the great trees. 
There were such good things to eat! And the only hard 
work they had to do was to gather and store away the 
shagbarks for the winter, and to collect feathers and 
soft grasses and tough leaves to line the house where 
they spent their winters, in the hollow heart of the 
great tree that they had heard people speak of as the 
‘^Grandfather Oak.” Those things meant going back 
and forth many times when they wished to play; but 
old Mr. Squirrel and his wife would not let them be idle, 
for they were wise, and knew that a time would come 
when they would need the warm grasses and feathers, 
and the nuts and acorns. 

The family had already put away a part of its winter 
stores, when one day Rags came home to tell of a dis- 
covery he had made. In one of the attic windows of the 
great house he had found a hole, and by going through 


178 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


it he had come upon wonderful things. Hanging over- 
head was a great store of corn, and on the floor were 
baskets and bags of nuts — so many that the whole 
family could live on them for years, and not have to 
work at all. 

More wonderful still, there was in the attic the finest 
straw house that anyone had ever seen — big enough 
for the whole family; and near by it he saw things much 
better for beds than leaves and feathers could ever be. 

Rags said so much about his discovery that they all 
ran after him, to see. It was just as he had said, and the 
younger members of the family were for moving in at 
once; but Mr. Squirrel shook his head. 

‘‘The people might come back, and then we should 
be put out,” he said. 

But all the others talked so fast, and the children 
teased so hard, that at last he decided to move in. 

“We shall have a real bungalow,” said Hazel. 

In the little straw house Rags and his brothers cut 
two doors, one in the centre and the other at the end, 
and then they began to move the bedding in. Hazel 
chose a blue bed with yellow stripes, and Skinny a pur- 
ple one with white dots, and Mr. and Mrs. Squirrel a 
large soft red one. 

Then began a delightful time. No more need of 
carrying acorns or nuts, for here, close at hand, were all 
they could eat, just for the taking. On pleasant days 
they could go out through the hole in the attic window 
and play in the sun; and on stormy days they could stay 


WHY THE SQUIRRELS MOVED 


179 


in and chase one another, round the chimney and down 
the long floor and back; and at night no cold winds 
reached them in their snug house and warm beds. 

Is it any wonder that the whole family grew proud, 
and were no longer willing to do any work? 

But one sad day a terrible thing happened. The fam- 
ily had gone to bed. They were awakened by a great 
noise, a sound of heavy feet stamping up the stairs, and 
loud voices. 

‘‘Quick! Quick!’’ cried Mr. Squirrel. 

And they had just time to dash out through the hole 
in the attic window and perch, trembling, on the edge of 
the roof, in the winter cold, when the door burst open 
and a giant strode across the room with a great light in 
his hand. He picked up their bungalow as easily as if it 
had been a hand-bag; and then they heard him call 
out, — 

“Here, come and see what those rascally squirrels 
have done! They have gnawed holes in my straw suit- 
case, and dragged three or four of my 'neckties into it, 
for a nest, and have been living here like kings!” 

And then they heard a great pounding, so near that 
they all scurried away to the ridgepole; and when it had 
stopped, and the light had gone away, and all was still 
again, they crept back, and found that the hole in the 
window had been closed with a heavy board, and that 
there was no way to get back to their warm beds and 
the corn and nuts. 

That was a long, hard winter for the Squirrel family. 



There was no way to get hack to their warm beds and the corn 
and nuts. 



WHY THE SQUIRRELS MOVED i8i 


They had to go back to their old home in the Grand- 
father Oak and dig the snow and wet leaves out of the 
nest. Then they had to line it again, and all winter they 
had to paw under the grass and leaves and snow in the 
woods, and gnaw frozen apples in the orchard, to get 
enough to eat. They were ashamed to ask their cousins, 
the Rufus Squirrels, for even a single acorn, and were 
glad enough when spring came again. 

The next year they began early, and put the old nest 
in order, and laid in a great store of good things, so that 
no one could turn them out of doors again 


Grandfather’s Dan 

I N the parlor of the little house which cuddled close 
under a hill by the seashore there hung a picture 
that Johnnie liked to look at. 

It was the picture of an old white-haired man, sitting 
on a bench by an open door. In his lap he held a long 
gun, and between his knees nestled a large and very 
handsome Newfoundland dog, with long curly black 
hair; but on the face and chest and about the fore paws 
and the tip of his tail, there were patches of pure white. 

The man was Johnnie’s grandfather, who had lived 
all his life in this little house by the sea, and the dog was 
old Dan. Grandfather had raised him from a puppy, 
and had kept and loved him until old age came and 
called him away to the place where good dogs go. 

During all his long life Dan had been a real help to 
his master, and Johnnie was fond of hearing his grand- 
mother tell of the way the dog had paid his board; but 
best of all, he liked the story of the time when his grand- 
father had to help Dan. This is the story he had heard 
so often. 

The coast on which the little house stands is very cold 
in winter. The ice forms thick in all the little coves, and 
sometimes it freezes hard way out into the’ bay. Food 
is not easy to get, and sometimes the family would have 
to go hungry if it were not for the ducks. 


GRANDFATHER’S DAN 


183 


All along the shore, and especially in the little coves, 
there are great flocks of wild ducks that come down 
from the far north in order to find open water and some- 
thing to eat. Whenever grandfather’s family had need 
of meat, grandfather would take down his long gun, 
and going down to the shore, would build a little fort of 
cakes of ice and snow, and by hiding in that, he would 
by and by get a shot at some ducks. Then it was that 
Dan earned his board. As soon as he saw a duck fall, 
away he would go, over the icy shore and into the water. 
He would swim out to the duck, take it carefully in his 
mouth, and swim back and lay it at his master’s feet. 

This went on for many years. No swim seemed too 
long and no water too cold for the dog; and by his work 
and grandfather’s gun there was usually good meat in 
the little house. 

But of course Dan was growing older all the time, 
and a dog gets to be old before a boy gets to be a young 
man. 

One day, when a northeast storm had driven great 
flocks of ducks into the cove, and piled the cakes of ice 
thick along the shore, grandfather took old Dan with 
him and went out. 

• It was still snowing a little, and a strong wind blew, 
and because of that it was a good time to get ducks 
enough to last the family half the winter. The snow 
made it easier to keep hidden, and the wind made it 
harder for the ducks to hear the noise of the gun. 

Time after time, as old Dan saw a bird come down. 


i 84 uncle ZEB and HIS FRIENDS 


he plunged into the icy water, swam away into the mist 
of the snowstorm, and in a little while would come pad- 
dling back to the big ice-cake where grandfather lay, 
and drop his prize at the old man’s feet. He did that 
until thirty ducks were piled on the ice. And then he 
started out once more. Grandfather remembered after- 
ward that, before Dan let himself down into the water 
this time, he looked up into his face and paused a mo- 
ment and gave a whine; but he did not think much 
about it then. 

The duck for which Dan had started lay a long way 
off, so that the dog had to swim farther than usual; but 
he kept steadily on, pounding his way through the 
waves, until he reached the bird. Grandfather saw him 
take it in his mouth and start back. But the dog seemed 
to swim very slowly, and to make no headway against 
the waves. Then, suddenly, he dropped the bird and 
gave a long, whimpering cry. He was old. The chill of 
the waters had struck to his heart. His strength was 
gone and he could do no more. The cry was a call for 
help, to the friend he had known longest and best. 

The moment that grandfather heard the call he stood 
up and looked. He saw the old dog battling for his life, 
his head barely above water, his big, kind eyes turned 
toward the shore. Grandfather dropped his gun and 
tore off his heavy coat. ‘‘Hold on, Danny, old boy! 
I’m coming!” he called. Then he pulled off his boots 
and plunged into the water. 

The cold cut through him like a knife and stiffened his 


GRANDFATHER’S DAN 


i8S 

arms and legs, for he, too, was beginning to be old. But 
the thought of his faithful friend made him forget every- 
thing else, and after what seemed a long time he was 
able to reach out one hand and grasp Dan’s collar. 

It was a hard swim back to the ice-cake, but the dog 
helped himself all he could, and the hand on his collar 
kept his head above water. When they reached the ice, 
the man pushed the dog up first, and then the dog turned 
round, and fixing his teeth in the man’s shirt, helped 
him out. 

They left the ducks and the gun on the shore, and 
together crawled slowly up to the house, where grand- 
mother soon had them wrapped in hot blankets before 
a blazing open fire. 

After that day Dan would never let grandfather out 
of his sight, nor would he follow any other member of 
the family. 


His Task 

F ather,” said Tommy Harris, one day in June, 
‘‘if I earn some .money this summer, may I 
have it for myself, to do what I want to with?” 
“Why, yes, I think so,” said his father. “But what 
are you going to do? How are you going to earn any 
money?” 

“ I ’m going to mow Mr. Webster’s lawn. I heard him 
say he wished he knew of some boy he could trust to 
keep the lawn mowed all summer. I ’m going to ask him 
to let me do it. May I have the use of your lawn-mower 
if he gives me the work?” 

“Yes, if you will take good care of it and put it back 
where it belongs when you are done.” 

Tom promised, and the next day, when Mr. Webster 
came home from the city, he went over and asked him. 

The lawn was a large one, and there were some trees 
and shrubs on it. Mr. Webster got up from his piazza 
chair and took Tom down on the lawn. He showed him 
how he wanted it cut, and told him that the boy who got 
the job must be careful not to break the shrubs, and 
must not knock the bark off any of the young trees, and 
must trim the borders with the grass-shears and rake up 
and carry away the grass. 

“Do you think you can do that, and do it right, all 
summer?” Mr. Webster asked. 

Tom thought he could. 


HIS TASK 


187 


‘‘Well,” said Mr. Webster, “I want it cut once every 
week. I don’t care what day you cut it, because some 
weeks, when it rains a good deal, it grows faster than 
others; but I want it always to look neat on Sundays. 
You must watch it and cut it whenever it needs it. 
I will give you fifty cents each time.” 

Tom went home well pleased. He watched the lawn, 
and the next Wednesday he cut it very nicely, taking 
care to trim the edges and to carry away the grass, and 
not to break any of the shrubbery. 

The next week on Wednesday he was going to mow 
the lawn again, but there was a ball game that after- 
noon, and the boys wanted him to play first base. The 
grass did not look so very long, anyway, so he played 
ball, and was going to cut the lawn on Thursday. 

But Thursday it rained hard, and he could not work 
outdoors, so he had to wait till Friday. He cut the 
grass then, but it was much longer than it had been the 
week before, and so it did not cut so smooth. When he 
had finished it, there were some rough places where the 
tall grass had been pressed down by the lawn-mower, 
but had not been cut off. Still, he thought it would not 
be noticed. 

The next time the grass needed cutting, Tom went at 
it bright and early in the morning. He had got about a 
quarter of it done when Eddie Ives came along with a 
bat over his shoulder and a catcher’s mitt on one hand. 
He stopped at the fence, and called, “Come on, Tom! 
We’re going to play the White Stars.” 


1 88 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


“I can’t,” said Tom. ‘H must work.” 

‘‘Oh, you can do that in half an hour. Let it go till 
afternoon. We want you in the game.” 

Tom left the lawn-mower just where it stood, and 
went off with his friend Eddie. The boys all said they 
were glad he was there, too, because in the second inning 
he caught a high fly that put out the third runner of the 
Stars. 

But just before the end of the game, in trying to stop 
a hot grounder, he hurt his hand so badly that he had 
to go home and have it bandaged. It made him forget 
about Mr. Webster’s lawn and where he had left the 
lawn-mower. 

He thought of it the next morning, and tried to flnish 
the work; but the mower, being out in the dew all night, 
had rusted, so that it ran hard — and he could not find 
the oil-can. Besides, his hand hurt him. After a while 
he called in Jimmy Russell, who was passing, and got 
him to help. But Jimmy was small, and could not han- 
dle the mower very well. In going round one of the 
shrubs, he broke off a big branch; and he also knocked a 
piece of bark from the trunk of a small white birch tree, 
and the dark scar showed very plainly. 

By the time they had finished, it was too late to rake 
up the grass and carry it off. Tom kicked it round a 
little, where it was thickest, so that it would not look 
quite so bad. He said to himself that next time he 
would begin early and stick to it and do better. His 
hand would be well by that time. 


HIS TASK 


189 


But the next time never came. When the grass was 
long enough to mow again, and Tom went over to Mr. 
Webster’s place, pushing the lawn-mower ahead of him, 
he found the grass all nicely cut, and a short, red-headed 
boy raking it up. 

‘‘Here, Sam Casey!” cried Tom. “What are you 
doing on my lawn.^” 

“It is n’t your lawn any more. It’s my lawn.” 

“What do you mean?” asked Tom. 

“ I mean that I ’m going to cut it once a week all sum- 
mer, for fifty cents a time.” 

“Who told you so?” 

“Mr. Webster did — the man who lives here. He 
said he was tired of having it half-done or not done at 
all, and so I’m going to do it.” 

There was nothing more to be said. Tom went slowly 
home and put away his lawn-mower. The chance to 
earn some money during the summer was gone; but he 
had learned a lesson that in the end was worth a good 
deal more money; and the next summer, when he got 
other lawns to mow, he did his work well and faithfully. 


Roy’s Bear-Hunt 

T he moment that Roy stepped out on the back 
piazza he knew that it was just the morning for 
a bear-hunt. The air was clear and cool, with 
just a little bit of breeze blowing; not enough to make 
so much noise in the woods that you could not hear a 
bear coming, but just enough so that the bear could 
not smell you if you were careful to notice which way 
the wind was blowing. Then, besides, the grass was 
wet a little, so that the dead leaves did not rustle when 
you walked through them. 

Rpy had his new bow-gun, that Henry, the hired 
man, had made for him. It was a gun that would shoot 
very far and very hard indeed. Henry had tried it by 
shooting at a tomato-can which he had set up on top of 
a fence-post, and the arrow had knocked the can way 
off and made a big dent in it. The clump of trees and 
bushes at the back end of the orchard, near the spring- 
house, was the best place to hunt. Bears had often 
been seen all about there; and it was a fine place to look 
for them, because there were plenty of bushes where 
you could hide, and an old stone wall behind which you 
could creep up close. 

Roy loaded his bow-gun very carefully, putting in his 
best arrow. He had just started to steal along slowly, 
looking closely at the ground to see if he could find 


ROY’S BEAR-HUNT 


191 

any tracks, when there was a sharp bark at his heels, 
and Ginger, his fox-terrier, came rushing up, wagging 
his stump of a tail. 

‘‘Here, Ginger! You go back! You can’t come,” 
whispered Roy. “This is a bear-hunt. Go home now!” 

Ginger just wagged his tail harder, as much as to 
say, “Yes, sir. Certainly, sir,” and kept right on. And 
Roy had to let him go, because it would not do to make 
any loud talk or other noise that might frighten the 
bear. 

It took a long time to reach the hunting-grounds, 
walking very slowly and stooping a good deal, as you 
have to do when you are after bears. But by and by 
the edges of the bushes were reached, and Roy began 
to look even more carefully for tracks. He did not find 
any at first, although he looked under the syringa bush 
and all about the damp ground near the clump of rasp- 
berries; and bears are very fond of raspberries. 

But now he was approaching the currant bushes. 
Ah! There it was! A track! There were two tracks, as 
plain as could be! And looking ahead a little way, Roy 
saw the bear himself — a big brown fellow, standing 
up straight on his hind legs under a currant bush, his 
little black eyes twinkling and watching out sharp. 

Now was the time to be very careful, because when 
bears stand up that way, it means that they are on the 
lookout for danger. 

The first thing was to find out which way the wind 
was. Of course, Roy could have looked back at the 


192 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


weather-vane on the barn if he had wanted to; but that 
would not have been the right way. So he wet his fore- 
finger and held it up in the air, as Henry had taught him 
to do. And by seeing which side of the finger got cold 
first, he could tell that the wind was blowing from the 
east. That was bad, because it was right toward the 
bear, which would be sure to smell him. 

The only thing to do was to work off to the right, get 
over the wall, and creep back to the left on the other 
side. If he could get as far as the crab-apple tree, he 
would be all right. 

Slowly he crawled from bush to bush, sometimes on 
his hands and knees, sometimes on his stomach, till 
he reached the wall. He climbed over without making a 
bit of noise, and began to creep toward the crab-apple 
tree. When, at last, he reached it, and stood up, very 
softly, very still, there was the bear within ten feet of 
him, standing, just as he had seen him first, under the 
currant bush. He had not seen Roy at all, or smelled 
him, or moved a single muscle. 

Pushing the gun carefully over the wall, Roy took 
steady aim. Crash! went the bow, and plunk! went the 
bear. He was hit square in the middle, and rolled over 
and over, and finally lay still on his back, with all four 
of his bare feet up in the air. 

With a shout, Roy started to climb the wall; but 
before he could get over. Ginger had rushed ahead and 
grabbed the bear, and was shaking him so that the fur 
was air coming off. 



He tied a long string to one of the hears hind legs, and with 
the gun over one shoulder and the string over the other, he 
started to drag the bear to the house. 





194 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


As soon as Roy could get the bear away from Ginger, 
he tied a long string to one of his hind legs, and with 
the gun over one shoulder and the string over the other, 
started to drag the bear up to the house. But just as 
he reached the stable, his sister Ethel came running out. 

‘‘Here, what are you doing with my Teddy bear.^” 
she cried. “You stop dragging him that way! You’re 
wearing him all out!” 

Roy stopped and untied the string. “Huh,” he said, 
“this is a bear that I just shot down in the garden! 
But you may have him!” 


Out of the Big Marsh 

O NE warm afternoon in August, Johnnie was sit- 
ting in Uncle Zeb’s shop, watching the old man 
as he put a new seat in a chair. 

‘‘I guess I shall have to go out to the big marsh 
to-morrow,” said Uncle Zeb. 

‘‘What do you have to go there for?” asked Johnnie. 
“To get some more rushes. I’ve got only enough left 
to finish this job, and August is the best time to cut 
them.” 

“What are rushes. Uncle Zeb?” 

“Why, these things”; and the old man held up the 
coarse cord that he had been weaving back and forth 
across the frame of the chair. 

Johnnie saw then that it was not a string, as he had 
thought, but the long, dry, ribbon-like leaves of a plant, 
twisted tightly together; and Uncle Zeb told him how 
rushes grow, and that in August, for hundreds of years, 
people have gathered them to make seats for chairs. 
“May I go with you ? ” asked Johnnie, after a while. 
“Do you think your legs are long enough?” 

“Why, is it very far?” 

“Not very far from here to there, but pretty far up 
and down. The mud is deep. Do you think you could 
stand it to sink in up to your knees, and feel the cold, 
black mud oozing up between your toes?” 


196 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


Johnnie thought he could. 

‘‘All right, then,” said Uncle Zeb. “You be here at 
nine o’clock to-morrow morning. Perhaps you can help 
me some; and anyway, it’s more fun when there are 
two.” 

So just as the clock struck nine the next morning, 
Johnnie turned in at the old man’s gate. Uncle Zeb 
was ready. He gave Johnnie a pair of funny little thin 
boards to carry — boards about a foot wide and two 
feet long, with holes in them in which were straps like 
skate-straps. In his own hand he carried a sharp sickle. 

It took them nearly an hour to reach the marsh, for 
the old man wore long, heavy rubber boots, and walked 
slowly. 

The marsh was beautiful, Johnnie thought; for as far 
as he could see on every side the soft green of the rushes 
stretched away like a great field of grain, bending and 
bowing to the morning breeze. But it was wet, as the 
old man had told him it would be. 

He was about to take off his shoes and stockings 
when Uncle Zeb said, “Do you think it is too warm for 
snowshoes?” 

“Snowshoes.^” asked Johnnie, wondering what the 
old man meant. 

Uncle Zeb laughed. “Well, then, let ’s call them 
mud-shoes.” 

And with that he picked up the two little boards that 
Johnnie had been carrying, and showed him how to 
strap them on his feet. When they were once in place, 



Both Johnnie and Uncle Zeh worked hard until nearly noon, 
cutting the rushes and tying them into bundles. 


198 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


Johnnie found that he could walk even on the softest 
places without sinking in. It made him feel almost as 
free as a bird. 

Both Johnnie and Uncle Zeb worked hard till nearly 
noon, cutting the rushes and tying them into bundles, 
which they carried to the dry bank by the side of the 
marsh. 

Just as Johnnie started out with the last bunch, 
Uncle Zeb stooped and began to pull up some rushes by 
the roots. To Johnnie they looked exactly like those 
that they had been cutting, but Uncle Zeb showed him 
that they were different. The roots were almost as large 
as a man’s finger, and full of twists and turns, as if 
they had started to grow in one way, and then had 
changed their mind. Johnnie thought they looked 
wiggly, like big fuzzy worms, for between the joints at 
the top of the roots were rows of little hairs that made 
him think of caterpillars. 

‘‘We may as well have some sweets, to pay us for our 
work,” said the old man, as he put the roots in his 
pocket. 

As soon as they got back to the house Uncle Zeb took 
the roots from his pocket and washed them under the 
pump. When they were clean he cut them into little 
squares, which were white at first, but which in a little 
while began to take on the color of violets. 

Into a small tin dish he put some sugar, and over it 
poured hot water until the sugar melted. When it had 
boiled a few minutes, and become a thick syrup, he put 


OUT OF THE BIG MARSH 


199 


the little squares into it and stirred them round until 
they were all covered with the melted sugar. Then, 
with a skimmer, he took them out and spread them on a 
clean sheet of paper, where the wind would strike them, 
but not the sun. 

In a little while they were dry, and Johnnie noticed 
that each square sparkled like the head of a frost-cov- 
ered nail. 

‘‘Taste them,” said the old man. 

Johnnie put one into his mouth. It was different from 
anything he had ever tasted before, but good; a little 
“bitey” when he chewed it, but sweet and full of flavor 
as long as he only sucked it. 

“What is it.^” he asked. 

“Sweet flag-root,” said the old man. “When I was a 
boy, people used to take it to church with them, to 
keep them awake through the long sermons; and even 
now doctors sometimes use it in medicine. So you see 
that the big marsh is really a furniture store, a candy 
shop, and a drug store, all in one, and you can pay in 
work for everything that you get there/’ 


Grandmother’s Panther 

O NE winter a good many years ago, when Grand- 
mother Fossett was a small girl, it began to be 
told from house to house in the little village 
where she lived that some fierce wild animal was prowl- 
ing about. 

No one had seen it, and no one knew what it was. 
The first news came from David Rollins, who had been 
roused from a sound sleep one dark night by a great 
bellowing and stamping among the cattle in his barn 
and a loud squealing among the pigs. He slipped into 
his clothes as soon as he could, and hurried out. He 
found all the animals very much excited and fright- 
ened, and one pig, in the pen under the barn, was badly 
cut or scratched about the head. There was nothing 
else to be seen, and as the ground was bare and frozen 
hard, no tracks could be found. 

In a week another neighbor, Mr. Peleg Gibson, came 
home from his wood-lot one evening much excited and 
very pale. He had been cutting cord-wood all day, and 
had not started for home till nearly dark. A part of the 
way led through a swamp where there was a thick growth 
of cedar, so that he could see only a little way on either 
side. While he was going through the swamp, Mr. Gib- 
son heard a stick snap, and by and by another; then he 
heard soft foot-falls, and became sure that something 


GRANDMOTHER’S PANTHER 


201 


was following him. He did not dare run, but walked as 
fast as he could; and whatever it was that was following 
him kept up the chase until he came out into the open 
orchard just back of the house. 

By that time the little settlement began to be much 
disturbed, and everybody talked of the strange animal. 
Some thought it was a wolf; others said it was probably 
a bear; still others believed it was only a big wildcat or 
lynx. But some felt sure that it was a panther. 

Then came the first big snow, which settled down to 
make good sleighing. The roads were rough and poor, 
and every winter, as soon as it got cold enough to make 
good thick ice, the people began to use the Kennebec 
River to travel on, because a sleigh would run better on 
the smooth, level ice than on the ‘‘bumpity” roads. 

One evening, a few days after the big snow, the whole 
village was stirred by the attempt of some animal to 
attack Gideon Lang’s colt right in the barn-yard. The 
men were milking when they heard the colt scream. 
They rushed out just in time to see a big, shadowy thing 
leap over the bars at one jump and disappear in the 
darkness. They got lanterns and returned, and soon 
found the tracks in the snow — great tracks twelve or 
fifteen feet apart. There was no longer any doubt that 
the beast was a panther, and a big one, too. 

The next day it was decided to have a grand hunt. 
All the men in the settlement, and all the dogs, were to 
gather at noon and chase the panther until it should be 
caught. There was great excitement among the chil- 


202 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


dren, and Grandmother Fossett, who was then nine 
years old, helped to put up a luncheon for her father and 
brothers, because they thought they might have to be 
away all night. And she was out with the others at 
noon to see the hunters start. 

But that very afternoon word came up-river that 
grandmother’s married sister, who lived twelve miles 
below, was sick, and wanted Polly — that was grand- 
mother — to come at once. She had sent Nathan, her 
husband, to bring Polly in the sleigh. 

It was nearly dusk before they could make the start; 
but at last old Canada, the faithful little black mare, 
picked her way carefully down the steep, icy hill, and 
came out on the smooth, broad surface of the frozen 
river, with Polly snugly wrapped in a red shawl and 
warm buffalo-robe. 

Her first thought when she found she was to go had 
been of the panther. What if it should get away from 
the men and the dogs, and follow her ! 

Out on the river it seemed very still and scary. Once 
she heard dogs barking away off somewhere down-river, 
and that made her think still more of the panther. 
The moon was small and gave only a little light, and the 
road, which followed close to the high bank, lay almost 
wholly in shadow. 

Every time a tree or a limb cracked in the frost 
Polly’s heart beat so hard she could hardly swallow, and 
in every black stump she thought she could see a great 
crouching beast ready to spring upon her. 


GRANDMOTHER’S PANTHER 


203 


When she told Nathan how scared she was, he only 
laughed and said he “guessed there was n’t much dan- 
ger.” If he had only said there was n’t any danger, and 
said it as if he knew! But he did not. He just said 
‘‘much danger.” 

The journey was nearly half-over when the sleigh 
reached a dark wooded point that ran out into the 
river. Just as they turned the point Polly chanced to 
look back along the way they had come. There was 
only a moment before the point shut off the view, but 
in that moment Polly suddenly saw a great black shape 
appeal from a dark shadow, flash across a patch of 
moonlight, and come tearing along the road in great 
leaps. 

With one wild scream Polly cried, “He’s coming! 
He’s coming! The panther is coming! He is right here 
behind us! Oh, quick, quick!” and grabbed Nathan’s 
arm. 

Nathan turned his head, and almost without know- 
ing it, hit old Canada a sharp crack with the whip; 
and as he looked back, the black shape came round the 
sleigh. 

Polly was now so frightened that she could not even 
scream; but just as she thought she could almost feel 
the panther’s awful teeth, the black shape came up 
even with old Canada’s head, and leaping sidewise, let 
out a loud bark — a joyous “Wow! wow! wow!” of 
friendliness and welcome. 

It was old Prince, the family dog. He had got out 


204 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


of the shed and followed the sleigh, and he was the 
panther. 

Grandmother always said that the rest of that jour- 
ney was the happiest sleigh-ride she ever had. And she 
was happier still when she got home, a week later, and 
saw the skin of the real panther nailed on the door of 
the corn-barn, drying in the sun. She used to like to tell 
the story to her grandchildren, and I have told it to 
you just as she told it to us. 


■ Three Orphans 

T he Bradfords had been settled in their summer 
home nearly a week when Louis, looking up from 
his book one afternoon a little before sunset, 
saw a small brown head pop out from under the corner 
of the carriage-house. 

At first the only thing that he could think of was a rat, 
for he had heard his father say at breakfast that rats 
had been getting into the grain. But he kept very still, 
and in a little while the head poked out farther, and 
then the whole body followed, and he saw that the ani- 
mal was much larger than a rat. In fact, it was as large 
as a full-grown cat or a small dog. It had a round, fat 
body covered with grayish-brown hair, and a broad 
head with small ears that hardly showed at all. 

With little runs of a foot or two at a time, the creature 
ventured farther and farther away from the corner of 
the carriage-house; and then, to Louis’s astonishment, it 
stood up on its hind quarters, with its fore-paws hang- 
ing down in front, and looked all about, to see whether 
it was safe to go any farther. But just then Louis leaned 
too far forward in his eagerness to see, and his book 
slipped to the floor of the piazza with a loud slam. At 
that, the strange animal flashed back out of sight into 
his hole so quickly that it looked like a mere brown 
streak. 


2o6 uncle ZEB and HIS FRIENDS 


When Louis told the gardener what he had seen, the 
old man laughed, and said he guessed it was only a 
woodchuck, and that they would see him again before 
long; but though Louis watched for several days, he saw 
nothing more of the brown head or the fat, round body. 

But one morning he waked very early, and looking 
out of his window, saw the woodchuck feeding in plain 
sight on the grass-plot behind the house. 

In the corner stood the little rifle that had come to 
Louis’s older brother as a Christmas present, and on a 
shelf near by stood the box of cartridges. Louis had 
been allowed to use the rifle when he was with his 
brother, but had never tried it alone. Now, he thought, 
his chance had come. 

Very quietly he slipped over to the corner, took down 
the box of cartridges, and slipped one of them into the 
rifle. Then, barefooted, he tiptoed downstairs, care- 
fully slid the bolt of the back door, and stepped out. 
Stealing to the corner of the house, he looked round. 
Yes, the woodchuck was still there, and still feeding! 
It had not been alarmed. 

Louis raised the little rifle slowly, rested the barrel 
against the corner of the house, took careful aim, and 
pulled the trigger. At the report he saw something flop, 
and ran to the edge of the grass-plot. There lay the 
woodchuck, still now, and looking up at Louis with 
glazing eyes, as if to say, ‘‘Why did you do it.^ Have I 
ever harmed you.^” And then the eyes closed, and the 
woodchuck was dead. 


THREE ORPHANS 


207 


Louis went back to the house; but instead of feeling 
proud of what he had done, he began to ask himself why 
he had done it, and he could not find any good answer. 

To be sure, he had heard the gardener say that wood- 
chucks destroy garden vegetables; but when he looked, 
after breakfast, he could find none that seemed to have 
been nibbled; and when he went to see what the little 
animal had been eating when he shot it, he found only a 
patch of clover. 

“What about the young ones?” asked the gardener 
that noon. 

“Young ones?” asked Louis. “What young ones?” 

“Why, that old woodchuck had a family. There are 
three young ones in the hole under the carriage-house. 
I saw them all out together the other day,” said the 
gardener. 

“Will they starve to death?” asked Louis, much 
troubled. 

“Lm afraid they will, unless somebody kills them — 
or feeds them.” 

Louis asked no more questions. That afternoon he 
went to work with a spade at the corner of the carriage- 
house. It took him until nearly night, but when he 
finished, he had three little balls of fur, with frightened 
black eyes that watched every move he made. The 
gardener found an old squirrel-cage in the loft, and into 
it they put the three orphans, with a big bunch of fresh 
clover; and in the morning the clover was gone. 

That is the way Louis got his little family. Two or 


2o8 uncle ZEB and HIS FRIENDS 


three times a day he had to feed them, but he felt paid 
when he saw how quickly they began to lose their fear 
of him. In a week he could take them out of the cage 
and handle them as he could the kitten; and in two 
weeks they would run all round the yard, picking a 
dainty clover-leaf here and a little sorrel there, but 
always ready to come running when he whistled to 
them. It always made him laugh to see them sit up 
first, when he whistled, to see where he was before they 
started. 

Never did any other family of orphan woodchucks 
fare so well! Besides the clover and the sorrel, there 
were tender leaves of lettuce, and the juicy pods of 
peas, and bits of carrot. All of the family grew round 
and fat, as their mother had been, and all of them fol- 
lowed Louis round; and whenever the cook would let 
them, they would crawl in behind the stove and cuddle 
together and sleep. 

When September came, and it was time for Louis to 
go back to school, the three orphans, now big enough to 
take care of themselves, were taken to the pasture, and 
set down beside a beautiful hole in the ground. But 
since then, Louis has never taken a rifle in his hand 
without first stopping to ask himself what he was going 
to do, and why. 


A Game Postponed 

I N the shade of a big maple that grew by the side of 
the road sat a small boy with a very sour look on 
his face. In one hand, he held a baseball. The 
other rested on a bat that lay by his side. In the field 
across the road a few boys of about his own age were 
playing; along the road were passing little groups of 
children with flowers in their hands. 

A brass band had gone by a few minutes before, with 
a line of white-haired old men trailing after it; but even 
that had not driven the sour look from the face of the 
boy under the tree. The music was slow and queer, and 
the old men dragged along, some of them out of step, 
and all of them looking worn and tired, and very little 
like the men in uniform who usually march behind, a 
band. 

Everyone seemed to be going to the burying-ground 
that lay next to the ball-field. When most of the people 
had passed, an old man came along the road. He walked 
slowly and with a cane, and in one hand carried a large 
bunch of lilacs and lilies of the valley. Roddy Wilkinson, 
the boy under the tree, saw that the old man wore a 
broad-brimmed black hat like the other old men who 
had gone by, and had a little copper button in the lapel 
of his coat; but it did not interest him. 

When the old man saw the big maple, he stopped, and 


210 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


took off his hat and wiped his forehead, for the day was 
hot. Then he went over toward Roddy, climbed the 
little slope of the bank, and sat down. 

At first he sat still, and said nothing; but in a little 
while, seeing the ball and the bat, he looked down at 
Roddy with a smile, and said, ‘‘Going to have a little 
game.^” 

“No, sir, ’’ Roddy answered. “ I was going to, but my 
father told me I must n’t — at any rate, till afternoon. 
I don’t see what difference it makes — just because a 
lot of people want to take flowers to the graveyard. I 
did n’t know any of those soldiers.” 

“No, of course not,” said the old man, in a kindly 
way. “You did n’t know them, and they did n’t know 
you, but they thought about you a good deal.” 

“Who — me.^” asked Roddy, with a puzzled look. 

“Yes, about you and all the other boys who were to 
come after them. That’s why they did what they did. 
They had to look a long way ahead, and think of others 
instead of themselves. If they had thought only of 
themselves, they would have stayed at home. 

“Now there was Johnnie Cramer. He was only six- 
teen — a boy just like you, who liked to coast and skate 
and play ball, when he did n’t have to work to help his 
mother. He went as a drummer-boy, and they said 
that before the year was out, he was the best drummer 
in his corps. But one night, after a big battle, he was 
missing, and some of the men went out to look for him 
with lanterns. They found him lying dead across his 



“ They felt sure that the hoys who came after them would learn 
from them the lesson of how to do the hard thing if it is the right 
thingT he said. 



212 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 

drum, with the sticks still fast in his hands. He lies just 
over the wall there’’; and the old man pointed toward 
the graveyard. 

‘‘And there was Larry Owen. He was the color-ser- 
geant, — carried the flag, you know, — and when they 
were charging up a hill, and a bullet cut the flagstaff in 
two, Larry caught the colors, and carried them on half- 
way up the slope. As he fell, he passed the flag to his 
chum, Joe Woodman, and then Joe carried it. He fell 
just as his regiment took the hill. 

“ Of course, not all the boys were killed. A great many 
of them came back, but some of them were crippled, and 
• all of them had lost four of the best years of their life. 
They found it hard to catch up with those who stayed 
at home; so most of them have been poor, and have had 
to work hard since. But they have never been sorry; 
they did what was right, and no one is ever sorry who 
does that. 

‘‘I think the only thing that could make them sorry 
would be the feeling that we had forgotten them, or had 
never understood what they did and why they did it. 
They felt sure that we would always remember, and 
especially that the boys who came after them would 
learn from them the lesson of how to do the hard thing 
, if it is the right thing. 

^ “That is why I always come over here on Memorial 
Day. It may not do any good to those boys that lie over 
there in the grass under the trees, but it does me good. 
I go over there, and say to myself, ‘Johnnie Cramer, we 


A GAME POSTPONED 


213 


have come again because we have not forgotten; here’s 
something to show that we still keep you in mind. 
Larry Owen, the country remembers^ and sends these 
flowers. Joe, you fought a good flght, and your name 
shall not fade. 

The old man got up slowly, and said, ‘‘It will not be 
long till afternoon, and then you can have your game.” 

But Roddy had got up, too, the sour look gone from 
his face, and something of eagerness and of shame glow- 
ing there instead. 

“I won’t play!” he cried. “I don’t want any game! 
Give me some of those flowers, and let me go with you !” 


The Scratching on the Door 

A ll winter Bobby had been counting the days until 
spring; for his father had promised him that this 
year he should go with his big brothers to the 
sugar-camp back in the hills and help to make the family 
supply of maple syrup and sugar. And now the time 
had come, and Bobby was really there in the camp, a 
snug cabin nestling in a big stretch of woods, with a clear 
spring and a lively little brook near by. It seemed too 
good to believe! For three days now he had been there, 
without going home at all. Someone went out to the 
farmhouse every day and brought in a great basket of 
good things to eat; and at night Bobby slept in a little 
bunk in the corner, on a bed of sweet-smelling balsam 
boughs. 

To people who are not used to the northern hills in 
March it would not have seemed like spring, for the 
snow still lay thick in the woods, showing as plainly as 
the page of a book how and where the rabbits and the 
partridges got their dinner, and how the foxes followed 
the little wood-mice along their zigzag pathways, and 
at last pounced upon them and gobbled them up. In 
the morning and the evening it was still very cold. Ice 
formed thick in the spring hole, and the snow went 
crunch, crunch, when anyone walked on it; but in the 
middle of the day the sun shone warm, the crows flew 



Bobby had been busy every minute. Sometimes he helped to empty 
buckets, and sometimes he drove qH Buck hctrnessed to the 
sleigh that drew the sap to camp. 


2i6 uncle ZEB and HIS FRIENDS 


back and forth, calling loudly to one another; and all' 
about, when it was still, you could hear the drip of the 
sap as it fell into the buckets. 

Bobby had been busy every minute. Sometimes he 
helped to empty the buckets, sometimes he dipped the 
scum from the boiling sap in the great evaporating-pan, 
sometimes he drove old Buck, harnessed to the big sled 
that drew the sap to camp. All of it was such fun as he 
had never known before. 

But now, on the evening of the third day, he did not 
feel quite so happy, for he was to be all alone until nearly 
morning. That afternoon his father had slipped on an 
ice-covered root and sprained his ankle, and the two 
older boys, Bobby’s brothers, had had to put him on the 
sled and carry him home. They had told Bobby what to 
do — that he must not go to sleep, but must sit up to 
skim the sap and keep the fire going; and they had left 
a pile of wood, carefully picked, of sticks small enough 
for him to lift. 

“Now,” said Edgar, “don’t be afraid. There is noth- 
ing that will hurt you, and we shall come back as soon 
as we can.” 

So Bobby was left all alone in the great woods, miles 
from any other house. 

It was very still. Once a big owl somewhere off in 
the night called, “Whoo! Whoo! Whoo-whoo, whoo!” 
But Bobby knew who he was, and so was not afraid. 
And then he heard a fox bark snappishly, as if scolding; 
but a fox could not hurt, and so that did not frighten 


THE SCRATCHING ON THE DOOR 217 

him, either. Then, as he sat there all alone, he thought 
he should like to make some maple “wax,” by cooling 
thick syrup until it was tough and “chewy.” So he 
hunted about the cabin until he found an empty can 
that had held baked beans. He washed it out carefully, 
poured the hot syrup into it, and, opening the door, set 
the can in the deep snow outside, and went in again to 
tend the fire. When he had filled the great brick fire-box 
he sat down to rest a bit. He cannot tell how long he sat 
there, for he thinks he must have fallen asleep for a 
minute or two, in spite of what his brother Edgar had 
said. The first thing he knew, there was a slight sound 
of crunching on the snow outside, as if someone was 
trying to walk very carefully, but was scuffing his feet a 
little. Then came a gentle foof! foof! as if something 
were snuffing at the crack of the door. 

Bobby held his breath, but his heart beat so fast that 
it seemed as if he could hardly breathe. In a little while 
he heard more crunching and scuffing, and then a noise 
as if some animal were eating — a kind of chupl chup! 
such as a pig makes when the skimmed milk tastes better 
than usual. 

Bobby was now really scared. What if it were a bear 
or a bobcat, and should try to get in! He looked round 
the cabin to see what he could use to fight with. There 
was the axe, of course, but it was too heavy for him. No, 
that would not do. Then he saw the long-handled dip- 
per, That might do! He could fill it with boiling sap 
and* throw it into the face of anything that should try to 
get in. 


2i8 uncle ZEB and HIS FRIENDS 


And then his heart almost stopped beating alto- 
gether, for a terrible racket began just outside the door. 
There were whines and cries as of some animal in pain, 
and the scratching of claws on the door, and at last two 
or three thumps against the side of the cabin. Bobby 
reached for the dipper and filled it from the part of the 
pan where the sap was boiling most furiously. But just 
as he lifted it, and stood there, waiting and trembling. 



The baby bear had smelled the syrup. 


his ear caught another sound — the sweetest he had 
ever heard. 

‘‘Get on there. Buck! Come back into the road! What 
ails you, anyway.?’’ It was Edgar calling to the horse. 
The boys were coming! 

Bobby threw the door open just as the sled drew up 
before the cabin. As the boys jumped off and Bobby 
rushed out, they saw something rolling about in the 


THE SCRATCHING ON THE DOOR 219 

snow and whining and clawing the air; and in the clear 
moonlight they caught a glimpse of something bright 
and shiny. There, almost at their feet, was the smallest 
cub bear that Bobby had ever seen. Its head, clear back 
to its neck, was thrust deep into Bobby’s can of maple 
‘‘wax,” and wedged there. It was plain that the baby 
bear had smelled the syrup and, being as fond of sweets 
as Bobby himself was, had thrust his head into the can 
and been caught by the jagged edges of tin round the 
top. It was not until nearly a week afterwards that they 
heard how the old she-bear, coaxed from her winter’s 
den for the first time by the warm sun of the day before, 
had been shot by a wood-chopper. When she did not 
come back, her hungry baby had started out to look for 
breakfast, and so had fallen into trouble. 

Of course, Bobby was allowed to keep the cub, and 
great times the two of them had, playing together, until 
the bear got so big that it was not regarded as safe to 
keep him any longer. Then Bobby gave him to the 
“Zoo” in a city not far from his home, and there he is 
yet, a full-grown bear now, and not at all careful about 
the way he dresses ; for the last time Bobby saw him, the 
seat of his trousers was all worn bare and rusty-looking. 
But, as Bobby says, what could you expect That is 
the only pair of trousers he ever had. 


The Tree that Fought for France 

O NE hot September day in the fall of 1915, a little 
boy lay quietly on his back, looking up through 
the branches of a great tree that spread its pro- 
tecting shade above him. He was thinking of the tree, 
and of all that it had seen, and of what it could tell if 
only its whispering leaves could talk; for he had heard 
a part of the story many times, and he wished that he 
could hear the tree tell the whole of it. 

It was his great-grandfather, Philip Le Blanc, and his 
great-grandmother who had come there first, so long 
ago that there were no houses and no other people any- 
where near. When they saw the tree, which even then 
was greater than any round it, and when they had drunk 
of the spring that watered its roots, his great-grand- 
mother had said, ‘‘Here let us stay.” So they un- 
yoked the oxen from the great wagon and began to 
make a home in the wilderness. But all that first sum- 
mer the tree was their real home, for under it they cook- 
ed and ate their meals, and under it they slept when 
the nights were hot. 

And by and by, even before they had finished the log 
cabin on the little knoll to the east, a son was born to 
them; and him, too, they called Philip; and his father 
said when he named him, “I have little to give thee, my 
son; but what God gave to me, that give I also to thee. 


THE TREE THAT FOUGHT FOR FRANCE 221 


Thou shalt have the great tree that has sheltered us in 
the wilderness, and that was thy first home. It shall 
be thine forever.” And so the tree came very early to be 
known as ‘‘Philip’s tree.” 

The second Philip, who was the little boy’s grand- 
father, had spent his life in making the forests into 
fields and in planting corn and wheat, and he, too, had 
a son whom he named Philip; and when he christened 
him he said, “My son, I have much to give thee, but 
nothing else so beautiful as the great tree that I had of 
^ my father. That, then, shall be your christening gift.” 
And so the tree was still called “Philip’s tree”; but this 
time the Philip that was meant was the little boy’s 
father. 

Those things, of course, the little boy could not re- 
member, for they happened long before he was born; 
but what he did remember was the day when his father 
had first told him the story of the tree, and at the end 
had said, “And now, my son, as my grandfather, the 
first Philip Le Blanc, gave the tree to my father, so I, 
the third in line, and the third to bear the name, now 
give it to you, for your very own, to love and cherish as 
we have loved and cherished it.” 

All those things the little boy thought of as he lay 
there and watched the sunlight dotting the leaves with 
gold. “And it is now my tree,” he said happily to him- 
self; “my very own.” 

He thought that he had spoken only to himself, and 
so he was startled to hear a little rustle in the grass and 


222 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


a man’s voice saying, “Yours, is it, my son? Then you 
are a lucky boy, for there are few like it now.” Then the 
stranger asked where the little boy’s father was, and 
went over to the house to see him. 

Philip saw him go in at the front door, and after a 
little while come out again, but this time Philip’s father 
was with him. The two of them crossed the dooryard 
and the road, and came over to where Philip was sitting. 

“There!” said Philip’s father. “Ask him yourself.” 
And he smiled. 

Then the stranger said, “My boy, who owns this 
tree?” 

Philip rose to his feet, for, although he could not tell 
why, it seemed as if something great was at hand — 
something in the presence of which it was not fitting to 
remain seated. So he stood up straight before the man 
and said, “I own it, sir.” 

“And will you sell it — to me — for a great deal of 
money — for a hundred dollars?” 

For a moment Philip looked at the man in wonder. 
“Sell it?” he said. “Sell my tree? No, sir.” 

Then the stranger turned to Philip’s father. “May I 
tell him the story?” he asked. 

“Yes, tell him. Tell him as you told me; for the tree 
is his, and he shall decide for himself.” 

And so, as they sat there under the tree, the stranger 
told the little boy of the great war: of how French men 
had been killed and French women had been driven 
from their homes and little French children were starv- 


THE TREE THAT FOUGHT FOR FRANCE 223 


ing. He spoke of the many things that France needed 
and could get only in this country; and then he rose and, 
laying his hand on the trunk of the tree, he said, ‘‘She 
needs your tree. She needs it for gunstocks, for it is a 
black walnut, and so large that it will make hundreds of 
stocks, and of no other wood can good stocks be made. 
It is a noble tree. It has been in your family for genera- 
tions, — I know the story, — and it is like an old and 
dear friend. But your people and your father’s people 
came from France many years ago to help this country 
when it was poor, and the land has blessed them and 
made them rich. Now France needs your help — she 
needs your tree. Will you sell it to me — to fight for 
France.^” 

The little boy looked with wide, startled eyes at his 
father. “Is it true, father, what the man says?” 

“Yes, my son, it is all true.” 

Philip turned to the stranger. “Then you may have 
my tree,” he said. “But I will not sell it to you, I will 
give it to France.” 

“Will you let him do it?” asked the man of Philip’s 
father. 

“It is his, and he has done as he wished,” said his 
father, and laid his hand on Philip’s head. Then he and 
the man walked away together. 

In a week workmen came with saws and axes and laid 
the great tree low. Then they brought a little mill and 
cut the log into blocks and the blocks into slices and the 
slices into strips, and loaded them on trucks and hauled 


224 UNCLE ZEB AND HIS FRIENDS 


them away. And the place where the tree had stood was 
lonesome and bare. But as Philip thought of the strips 
of wood that the trucks had hauled away, it seemed to 
him that every one of them was a tough little brown 
soldier gone to fight for France. 

I do not know who told the story, or how it got across 
the sea, but a little more than a year afterwards there 
came to Philip a big wooden box with strange, foreign- 
looking labels on it; and within was a case of polished 
walnut that held a wonderfully beautiful rifle. The 
metal parts were richly engraved, and the stock was of 
that lovely curly wood that comes only from the part of 
the tree where the trunk joins the roots; and set into the 
stock was a plate of gold on which was engraved : — 

To 

Philip Le Blanc 
The Republic of France 
makes this grateful acknowledgment 
of a hoy's nohle and warm- 
hearted gift 

Never again will the birds sing in the branches of the 
old walnut, but in a boy’s heart will sing throughout all 
his life voices sweeter than those of bird or flute, for they 
are the voices of patriotism and sacrifice and service. 


THE END 










j -A - ^ 








r* 










>^fv-A, - ,l>,i. f 




*.4* 


► I 


<A,' 






4fZ 


.Tviir 


/i 


-fi^. 




JfV 


f' .:^Ti 








' '#. 






xH 




‘V7? 




j : 


< <. 


Hi 


'<ft. 


»' ^1 


T< 




¥ 




■".’'I 




>* ■“ 








': ♦ t. 


s ■- 


^ u.’ 






» Vl- 


V/'.' 


I . • 


-v 




♦' r 


» M 




»• ' ^ 




wv 






^ i 


IJU' 






:»TJ 


' .<• ' ^ i. ■* 


teTv 


r 


' * \*\ 




i '^.: 


>1 


.49 


* . •• 


... V 


.i'f 








iv: 


> »5 










?1 




.1^ 


k > 


^ . <■ 


mT. 


i 


A' 


I 


I LW 


H n Lr^ 

1] . • ' :' ^ 


. '^IK' i'.fj 

V P, '■•:•;!. -..fjnRi 




iT'J 


Uf^i 


I'L-rf' 


'V 


j* - <1 • . 




a 




t « I 


V>' 


I 


> . >\ • 


> ' 




*f‘}U 


»#. . •» 


< f 




'f-xi , 






I * j 


r ' > 


r 


' lL\l‘ 
















;-iV 


,'/ . ♦ 






VV > ^■'■^ • ^;/T V ’ '■! 




[;^' i*' f 


M 


'm 


' ^ . '>f.‘ ' ■ 1 


r]r' ^ ’/- 

,>»V^ v’ 


a 




•; ■ 

‘V iVr 






. ? > 










rj^*vi 


■4 , V ’,' ■; ■•' '• • BBSSWy^f wj ^Sy.’‘. ^ ' >' , ^ ■ 'i Jii 


t» ■ 


"'1 •:■ jt;' f.t' »{...' • Ffj 

t • . ^’ /•- *' I ^ 

1 1 ^ ' V « * '^T ' * 


< > 


#1.4 - VfvtY 


■M 


:i- 


U' □!♦' • ■ • 


V 


*.p I 


rr 


u 




J.‘ 


i vr s 




1 


i * M ‘ 

It/. vS 


*r V 


'VS 


.X » 


^ * 


.V 


l<^. 


* r* 


V*. 




:} 


>f. ) 


t 


\ ■ • 




iTJ 


"1 - 




“fi< 












•i’ 




«v 


■ 

H 




.. . rt^ii 


♦.v. 






LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 





0DD^^a^^7t,^ 



